Hasta La Gadget!

This article was written on December 10, 2010 by CyberNet.

Windows only
One of the features in Windows 7/Vista that I use quite regularly is the ability to click on the time in the System Tray to reveal a month-to-month calendar. The only problem is that some of the systems I use on a regular basis are stilling running Windows XP, but in situations like that I fallback to a solution I’ve been using for years… a customized wallpaper for the desktop.

Lately I’ve been using a free app called SE-DesktopContructor that works really well. You can have it put both a clock and calendar on your desktop, and it works with custom images if you have an existing background that you’re particularly fond of already. Personally I opt for the solid black background for simplicity sake.

Here’s a rundown of my favorite things in SE-DesktopConstructor:

• Customizable colors along with preset themes.
• Adjust the positioning of clock/calendar using a drag-and-drop interface – remember, these are not widgets so any changes to the position will need to be made from within the settings interface.
• Turn on/off the display of the clock and calendar depending on your own needs.
• Automatically updates background as time/date changes.
• Portable version is available.

The only thing I don’t like is that I can’t set the clock to a 12-hour format, but they do have some analog styles available if you’d rather go that route.

SE-DesktopConstructor is available in both installable and portable formats. It will always need to be running if you want the wallpaper to automatically update, otherwise killing the app leaves the modified wallpaper in place. In my tests it only used up about 11MB of memory, and didn’t use any CPU except for the split-second that it makes the wallpaper change at the turn of each minute.

SE-DesktopConstructor Homepage (Windows only; Freeware)

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