Widgets 1.0 Requirements

This document lists the design goals and requirements that the Widgets 1.0 Specification needs to address in order to standardize how Widgets are scripted, digitally signed, secured, packaged and deployed in a way that is device independent, follows W3C principles, and is as interoperable as possible with existing market-leading user agents on which Widgets are run. Widgets or gadgets are usually small client-side Web applications for displaying and updating remote data, packaged in a way to allow a single download and installation on a client machine. Typical examples of Widgets include clocks, CPU gauges, sticky notes, battery-life indicators, and Web-enabled Widgets like weather forecasters, games, news readers, email checkers, photo albums and currency converters. A Widget may execute outside of a typical Web browser interface or in a kind of application commonly referred to as a Widget Engine.