Comments for Gadgets being promoted on Windows Live Spaces

Gadgets being promoted on Windows Live Spaces

2006-08-04T08:26:55Z

With the launch of Microsoft's blogging and social networking platform, Windows Live Spaces (formally MSN Spaces), there has been an increase in interest around gadgets - i.e. mini web apps. People can add gadgets into their Spaces site and Microsoft is starting to promote this feature heavily. Jay Fluegel of Microsoft has written a post to encourage developers to create gadgets for the Live Spaces platform. He wrote:

"...a big part of joining the Windows Live family today is support for web gadgets written by anyone including YOU! Thanks to the great work done on Gadgets to date, you can now write a gadget that works both in Live.com (personalized portal) and Spaces (online expression/identity). And, it only takes one person adding it to their space for your gadget to become popular -- visitors to that space can choose "Add to your space" or "Add to Live.com" right from the header of the gadget, then visitors to that space can add to their spaces, and it's off to the races!"

Gadgets are a way for external developers to get their apps onto the large Windows Live "family" of services - which drives usage and increases mindshare. This is what I call a real ecosystem at work, because Windows Live Spaces (and live.com, the personalized start page) is a platform that external developers can leverage to their advantage. It basically gives small developers access to a mass market, so it makes sense to put your app on there and potentially gain mass exposure. The same argument applies to doing a gadget/widget for MySpace or Google's platform, although MySpace doesn't really make it easy to leverage their platform.

I also like the guidelines Fluegel gives to potential Spaces Live gadget developers: make gadgets customizable, make them "reflective of the author's personality" [i.e. the Spaces user], and make sure it fits lots of different designs and themes. That old Web maxim: develop for the user first.

Developing MS gadgets - is it still too hard?

Details on developing gadgets for Live can be found at the Windows Live Dev site. Note that I've had some feedback from developers that Live gadgets are a lot harder to code than Google's gadgets. When I wrote about Google's gadget platform, Coogy developer Robert Yeager left this comment:

"In developing gadgets for Cooqy, our eBay search engine, we were able to have a Google gadget ready in about 5 minutes, but the Microsoft Live.com version took 5 hours! Oh, and the Microsoft version of our gadget doesn't work on Firefox!"

Microsoft's Mike Torres (from the Live Spaces team) replied in my comments:

"We're working pretty hard to have a consistent Live.com, Spaces, Windows Vista development story for mini applications. And of course, reducing the barrier to adoption by making it easier."

For more info on Live Spaces gadgets, the LiveSide blog has a podcast which explores the gadgets more with Jay Fluegel.

Finally, if you're a Live Spaces user, here are instructions to start adding gadgets to your page.

Comment from Laurence Timms on 2006-08-04

2006-08-04T13:51:44Z

Richard, creating Gadgets for live.com, live spaces and even start.com (the developer's sandbox and the precursor to both live.com and live spaces) is pretty straightforward. It's javascript with a few added API methods to make life a bit easier. For example, there is a dedicated proxy and method stack for consuming RSS feeds within a gadget.

Many of the gadgets on live.com will run on live spaces with no changes. Those that don't run immediately will probably only need tweaking.

I knocked up a simple word game called Trackword as a live.com gadget. I spent a few minutes today making sure it ran on live spaces. You can add it to your own live space if you want a try; just load the following url once you're logged into your live space: http://spaces.live.com/spacesapi.aspx?wx_action=create
&wx_url=http://laurencetimms.com/trackwordgadget/trackword.xml

Are Google gadgets inherently easier to code than live.com gadgets? No. It simply depends on what coding platform you're used to.

Comment from Kaj Kandler on 2006-08-04

2006-08-05T02:36:20Z

It's interesting you say "It basically gives small developers access to a mass market, so it makes sense to put your app on there and potentially gain mass exposure."

This is the opposite of what the cell phone networks do. They are the other mass market but they control access very tightly and it takes real dedication to convince them to accept any kind of application. Very often is takes years. Even more often it goes nowhere.

Imagine the growth rate of the first cell phone network that is build around this kind of extensibility. I believe the way to beat MySpace or MS Live Space or any of the "social communities" is to build a similar open phone network.

Any billionaire with ambition reading this?

Comment from Richard MacManus on 2006-08-04

2006-08-05T03:00:18Z

Thanks for your comment Laurence. The feedback I've been getting is that it's more difficult to convert an existing app into an MS gadget than into a Google gadget.

Excellent point Kaj! It's a great opportunity for the mobile networks.

Comment from laurence timms on 2006-08-05

2006-08-05T23:28:48Z

Yes, I'd accept that it's generally easier to convert an app to be a Google gadget than to convert it to become a live.com gadget - if you convert the whole thing.

My take is that live.com gadgets are a good UI interaction layer and they have good http request/response handling - therefore that's all I use them for. All the heavyweight processing and data mangling I do on back-end servers, and I use RSS for communication between the server and the gadget.

Horses for courses, really.