One of the most innovative and simultaneously controversial features of KDE 4 is the Plasma widget, Folderview. Simply put, it allows a user to display the contents of a file system folder within a widget on the desktop.

Karl Lattimer has created an experimental radial menu widget for GNOME called Fittsmenu. The Fittsmenu widget still has some glitches, but it is an impressive demonstration of the potential for practical GNOME user interface enhancements that support visually attractive features like transparency.

For most new android app developers (like me), it is a bit puzzling how to debug the android widgets or how to put a breakpoint in an android widget code. It seems a bit tricky because there is no activity to be launched, so eclipse just syncs your widget’s apk and installs it and that’s it. So, is it possible or not to debug widget code? and if yes, then is it very difficult?

KDE Plasma desktop offers an alternative to the traditional icons scattered all over the desktop with a Plasma widget called Shelf. Just like a shelf in a library, the shelf widget keeps files, folders, devices, and applications in order and easily accessible.

Guake - Quake-style terminal for GNOME
A Quake-style terminal is a drop-down terminal which can be shown/hidden just like the console in Quake (and most of the first-person shooter games out there), using the press of a key (~ in Quake). Guake is a terminal application written in GTK which uses the F12 keyboard shortcut by default to show or hide it.

The linux terminal can get boring at times owing to lack of colors & a rigid black background. Hardcore Linux enthusiasts won’t think about the appearance of the terminal but normal users will surely get bored of the monochrome terminal sooner or later. Surprisingly beautifying the terminal is pretty simple.

A frequent worry of Linux newbies is that they will have to learn how to use the terminal, something that is unfamiliar to new users. There is some debate, however, over when you have to use the terminal, if you have to at all. The question is: it is possible to use Linux without using the terminal?

Screenlets if you don't know it are little widget like things for your desktop. And if you use Compiz Fusion or Beryl you can use the like Mac's dashboard if you turn the widget plug in on.

The Symbian Foundation and Nokia with Maemo (now MeeGo) are building two widget sets on top of QGraphicsView – while both are called Direct UI, they are entirely different. It’s totally braindead to have incompatibe widget sets.