Mac Catalina Calendar Widget

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Mac mini-applications known as widgets help you get a quick snippet of information. Widgets generally serve a useful and singular purpose: from letting you track an overnight package to finding out whether your favorite team covered the spread. Fronted by large colorful icons, your Mac’s widgets appear when you summon Dashboard. This translucent screen lies.

Hi, I just updated to Catalina and am dreading the lack of a dashboard, so your suggestion helped me a lot! But I can't seem to get it to find the official Widgets (I've downloaded them online but they don't function, they say 'The widget referenced by this application cannot be found. Widgets are usually extensions that allow apps you’ve installed on your Mac to display additional information, via the Notification Center Today Tab. Some examples of widgets you’re likely to use, or at least come across, are Weather, Calendar, Social Media, and iTunes.

Edit: Seems like dashboard is removed from OS Catalina (thanks to the comment linking to other similar questions!), Is there any way to put dashboard widgets on desktop like it's shown in this video? UPDATE: Is there a way to get the Converter Tool somehow? (the widget that can convert currency, length, pressure, weight all in one!). On your Mac, click the Notification Center icon in the menu bar, or swipe left with two fingers from the right edge of the trackpad. In Notification Center, click Today. Do any of the following: Customize a widget: Move the pointer over the widget, then click the Info button that appears. Reorder widgets: Click Edit at the bottom of Today view, then drag a widget up or down.

Remember widgets?

Apple has quietly killed off Dashboard, its widget app, in its forthcoming version of macOS Catalina which was announced at its WWDC yesterday.

The discovery comes from Appleosophy, who found no sign of the feature when looking through the operating system, and no option to turn it off or on.

Dashboard was first introduced in 2005 in Tiger, as widgets became something of a hot new thing to have on your computer.

These widgets had basic functions like telling the weather, a calendar, and a calculator, but you could add on new widgets that could tell you how warm your computer was, or play the radio, for instance.

The mid-2000s saw a bunch of widget programs released, including Google Gadgets, Yahoo! Widgets (a.k.a. Konfabulator), and Windows Desktop Gadgets — all of which are since obsolete.

SEE ALSO: Apple announces macOS 10.15 Catalina

Apple stopped enabling Dashboard by default in 2014's Yosemite, given Notification Center did much of the same thing as Dashboard anyway, and the feature gathered dust as the rest of macOS moved forward.

Even Dashboard's look, the glossy gradient which was fresh more than a decade ago, seems outdated as the rest of Apple's software adopted a flatter design.

While Dashboard wasn't an oft-used feature for many people, we can imagine there are a few devotees out there who'll miss the old thing.

The Up Next and the Favorites widgets were popular widgets that were available in previous versions of iOS. The Up Next widget would show you the next alarm, calendar event or reminder you had scheduled. The Favorites widget would show you a selection of your favorite contacts.

See also: How to Download and Install the iOS 14 Update & Troubleshoot Common Problems

See also: Camera not Working after iOS 14 Update

These popular widgets are noticeably absent in iOS 14 and some users are pretty upset about it (See: How To Send Feedback To Apple). Although we can’t bring them back for you, we provide a guide here for setting up widgets that will give you back most of the features you miss from the Up Next and the Favorites widgets.

See also: Why is there an Orange or Green Dot on my iPhone?

The Up Next Widget

In iOS 14, we can still create widgets for both the Calendar and the Reminders apps. We can create a widget for Calendar and a widget for Reminders. You can have these two widgets side-by-side if you would like to see both at the same time or you can then stack the two if you would like to save space. Unfortunately, this would not allow you to simply look at the widget to see what is “Up Next” from among all calendar events and reminders, but simply scrolling through the widget stack (a small gesture to perform) to get to the other widget will show you the information.

See also: A Guide to the 5 Best iOS 14 Features

The one widget we don’t find in iOS 14 is an Alarm widget. And, although you can access the alarm settings under the Clock app on your iPhone, the only settings available for the Clock widget are the City, or time zone, settings for your Clock widget. Hopefully, there will be more widget options available in the near future. For now, you can follow these steps to create widgets that will give you a quick view of your upcoming events and tasks.

See also: Clock Widget Showing Incorrect Time in iOS 14

Create Calendar and Reminders Widgets

See also: How To Create a Family Calendar

  1. To create a Calendar widget, press and hold in an open space on your home screen, then tap the plus (+) in the upper-left corner of your screen.
  1. Scroll down until you see Calendar, then select it.
  1. Click Add Widget.
  1. Your Calendar widget will appear on your Home Screen.
Widget
  1. Now to add the Reminders widget, again press and hold in an open space on your Home Screen and tap the plus (+) sign in the upper-left corner of your screen.
  1. Scroll down and select Reminders.
  1. Choose Add Widget.
  1. Now you can either:
  • Click Done to leave the widgets separate, or …
  • Drag the Calendar widget on top of the Reminders widget to create a widget stack.
  • To scroll through the widgets in your stack, just touch the stack and slide your finger up or down to bring another widget to the top of the stack.

Mac Catalina Calendar Widget Templates

The Favorites Widget

Many users miss the Favorites widget that was previously available for your Today Page. It was a quick way to call those people you called most often. With the Favorites widget, you didn’t have to open your Phone or Contacts app and search or scroll through the list to find the person you were looking for. What we present here is a workaround using Shortcuts. It will allow you to create a Favorites widget for either your Home Screen or your Today Page that contains shortcuts to your favorite contacts.

See also: Widgets Not Working on iPhone or iPad

Create Shortcuts for your Favorites

  1. Open the shortcuts app: Swipe left-to-right to get to the Today Screen.
  1. Type Shortcuts in the Search field. Tap the Shortcuts app icon.
  1. Tap Shortcuts in the upper-left part of the screen.
  1. Tap the add folder icon in the upper-right part of the screen.
  1. Type a name for your folder, like Favorites. Then tap Add in the upper-right corner of your screen.
  1. Select your newly created Favorites folder.
  1. Tap the plus (+) in the upper-right corner of the screen.
  1. Tap Add Action.
  1. Scroll down to Call and select from one of the suggested contacts listed under Call, or tap the plus [+] to choose a contact.
  1. If you chose to add a contact, now tap Contact, then choose the person you would like set up the quick call shortcut for from your contacts list.
  1. Tap Next.
  1. Enter a name for your shortcut, then tap Done.
  1. You are now back to the screen for your Favorites folder in the Shortcuts app. You can see your new shortcut listed under Favorites.
  1. Continue to add more Favorites by repeating steps 7-12. When you are done adding all of your Favorites, then exit the Shortcuts app.

Add Favorites to Home Screen or Today Page

  1. To add your favorites to your Home Screen, press and hold an empty space on your Home Screen, then select the plus (+) in the upper-left corner of your screen.
  1. Scroll down until you see Shortcuts and select it.
  1. Swipe right and left to choose the size for your widget, then tap Add Widget. Don’t worry if your Favorites widgets aren’t showing. We can select them later.
  1. Now you can press and hold your new Favorites widget to move it around on your Home Screen, move it to another screen, or move it to your Today Page. Once you have your widget in place, press and hold on the widget to open its menu.
  1. Click on All Shortcuts to change the Folder selection.
  1. Choose your Favorites folder. Then tap anywhere outside of the Shortcuts Folder pop-up window to exit.

See also: Can’t Rearrange Apps On Home Screen? Fix

Now you have your Favorites on either your Home Screen or Today Page, whichever you chose. When you want to call one of your favorites, just tap their shortcut icon in your Favorites widget. Here are my Favorites on my Today Page.

Free Calendar Widgets

See also: How To Recover Deleted Contacts