Found: The Best Dashboard Widget For Your Mac.

My record is clear. I am not a fan of Apple’s Dashboard Widgets. There must be 4,000 or 5,000 by now, most of them useless exercises in futility.

Weather? Sure. Stock market updates. Yeah. Dictionary? Got one already. Google search? Safari does that. How about tracking packages? Hmmm.

Sometimes—not always—but sometimes you can run into a Dashboard Widget that just makes sense the first time you use it. Such is the case with Delivery Status.

If you’ve been a Mac user as long as me then you’ll remember Desk Accessories from the 1980s. That’s what Dashboard Widgets really are. They’re mini-applications that perform one or two specific functions.

Apple makes Widgets easily accessible, easy to create, and relatively easy to download and install. Most Widgets are free. If you get what you pay for means anything, then free might be the problem with most Widgets.

For whatever reason, most folks don’t like paying much for little one trick pony applications or utilities, and that’s what Widgets are, like it or don’t.

I have a few favorites, and I’m on record as saying that weather and stocks are near the top of my list. Also on top is Delivery Status.

In my job I have to order products. UPS. USPS. FedEx. DHL. Products are ordered from Amazon, Apple, Google and more. Tracking all the ordered packages takes effort. Rather, it used to. Delivery Status makes it easy.

No longer is there a requirement to visit every site to track my ordered packages because Delivery Status does it. One swipe of the mouse, one click and I can see where a package is, and plan accordingly.

All that’s needed is to enter the order’s tracking number and the method of shipment. Delivery Status takes over and tracks for me, gives me alerts; notifications which simply remind me that something is about to arrive, or warn me that something has gone wrong.

Think about the benefits of this behind-the-scenes agent that does your work for you while you do something else.

Most of the major transporters are included in Delivery Status, from the aforementioned UPS, USPS, FedEx and DHL, to Japan Post, ParcelForce, Posten, Canada Post, Purolator, Royal Mail, and many others.

Delivery Status is donationware, so it won’t cost you to download and try it, or even to use it. What’s missing? How about Delivery Status for the iPhone or iPod touch? The developer says an iPhone version is coming.