Amnesty Singles: Widgets flying solo
Originally downloaded 10/9/06. Mesa Dynamics has now released three widget-related applications under the Amnesty moniker. I’m among those who’ve felt that the original Amnesty application was way too expensive at $20… partly because I think Apple should add Amnesty-like functionality to Dashboard. However, Mesa has had a smaller idea in Amnesty Singles, which is half the price of the full version. Written up recently in Macworld, Singles sounds like it might be worthwhile. Rather than letting widgets run temporarily in desktop space—as Amnesty does—Singles actually converts widgets to full-fledged Mac OS X applications with menubars, spot in the dock, etc. Could be quite nice, especially since apparently you can still adjust the window layer and other widget-related gimmikry of Amnesty for your new applications.
Update 10/29/06. It’s still early in the lifespan of Amnesty Singles, but for now it’s not a tool I can use. The main problem is that the widgets become regular applications rather than remaining widgets, as with the regular Amnesty software. This means that in a case where you’re using Quicksilver, DragThing, LightSwitch, or some other tool to enable “single application mode,” the widgets disappear when you switch applications. This is the whole idea behind single application mode, and I find it’s a terrific strategy for minimizing desktop clutter. But widgets should be omnipresent, like your menubar or like tools such as iPulse or DropCopy. You don’t want to have to switch applications in order to use them (at least, I don’t). A developer at Mesa said they’d consider building that capability into a future version of Amnesty singles, and if they do, I’ll take another look
If that time comes, hopefully Mesa will have worked out the kinks in the way Amnesty Singles converts some widgets, because at the moment, the process is spotty. Some widgets work fine, others work sorta, and others don’t work at all. Growing pains, no doubt. But I certainly don’t want to pay for the pleasure of watching this little baby grow. 
Version as tested: 1.1.1.
