Website Design Tips - Hypergurl

What exactly are widgets?

Widgets can basically be thought of as shareable gadgets. Therefore a web widget is a portable piece of code that can be used easily on numerous websites. To display a widget on your own website, you simply need to insert a piece of code to your HTML. The widgets main programming code is stored on the original developers webhost but the graphical interface is displayed on your site.

For example, LabPixies has a Calorie Calculator Widget (gadget). As you can see below, for webmasters of health sites, this type of gadget is ideal to keep visitors coming back each day.

Note for webmasters: It's important to remember that the widget is being served from a 3rd party and will only load as fast as their webserver. If it is a popular widget you are using on your website, then it could slow down your page load time.

Listed below are some great sites where you can download free web widgets:

LabPixies has some of the coolest gadgets / widgets on the web including games such as Invaders, Backgammon, Marbles and many others. Their entertainment widgets include Flickr Slides, YouTube top feeds, Yahoo Music and ITunes feeds. While their tools category includes widget clocks, Calculators, To Do Lists and many others.

Widgipedia also has some terrific web widgets including Valentine’s Day gadgets, Flash Buttons, Questions and Answers, Support Forms, Order Forms and many others. All widgets also say whether they can be used on MySpace profiles.

Not all widgets are for use on websites. For example, Yahoo Widgets offers a huge collection of Windows and Mac widgets that you can download to your desktop. They offer news feeds, cam viewers, system utilities, games and heaps of others.

Last but not least, we can't go past Google Gadgets that offers over 3000 widgets. Your sure to find a few to add to your website to help keep those visitors returning often.