Why Vista SideShow is still on the sidelines

Computerworld - One of Windows Vista’s most intriguing new features has yet to fulfill its promise, as Microsoft Corp. wrestles with issues of hardware support and developer scarcity.

Windows SideShow was introduced with Windows Vista as a way for time-pressed users to find out the weather forecast, check for new e-mail, see the status of an eBay bid and more, all without turning on their PCs.

SideShow enables a secondary screen -- such as the 2.8-in. color LCD display mounted on the outside of AsusTek Computer Inc.'s W5Fe notebook computer -- to display information from special-purpose mini-applications called "gadgets" that reside on Vista’s desktop.

Vista isn’t the only way for users to use gadgets. Mac OS X features its own popular lineup of desktop "widgets." Meanwhile, users of Google and Yahoo can customize their home pages with Web-based gadgets. But using Vista with SideShow is the only way to view gadget information without turning on a PC or starting up a Web browser.

With today’s consumers expecting all of their virtual information to be at their fingertips anytime, SideShow should prove extremely compelling, according to Rushang Shah, marketing director at CompanionLink Software Inc. "SideShow presents a dream [of providing] a window to our PCs," Shah said. CompanionLink has developed a trio of gadgets, including a traffic webcam, that is available on the Windows Live download site.

But as is often the case with Microsoft, the company’s reliance on an ecosystem of partners such as CompanionLink that are ultimately looking to profit from SideShow has led to a familiar chicken-and-egg scenario.

Hardware hard to find

At last week’s Windows Hardware and Engineering Conference (WinHEC) conference in Los Angeles, Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates showed off a still-in-concept notebook PC co-created by Intel Corp. that includes a much-larger color SideShow screen on the outside than AsusTek’s. (Segment starts at 14:45 in the keynote video.)

But the AsusTek laptop is the only SideShow hardware that consumers appear to be able to buy today. Windows peripherals maker Ricavision International Inc. has announced four SideShow products, including a remote control, an e-book reader, an electronic notepad and an e-mail device. Some of those designs have already been licensed to vendors that should produce gear by this Christmas season, according to Max Li, CEO of the Newport Beach, Calif.-based company.

But the dearth of SideShow hardware means low usage of SideShow gadgets so far.

"We are still seeing very basic early adopter traffic," says Tamir Melamed, vice president of technology at the company behind the popular WeatherBug gadget.

While the free WeatherBug gadget for the Vista desktop has been downloaded more than 600,000 times since the end of January, the version that works with SideShow hardware has been downloaded less than 10,000 times, Melamed said.