I've been asked to review Widgenie and since I'm a nice person - why not?
Widgenie is basically a widget creator that takes data from variety of sources: excel and csv files for now and in the future Google docs and more data sources. After you declare your data source you can change the look of the widget and then you can publish it in variety of ways: Facebook, blog, comments, etc.
I'm writing this post while creating my first widget so these comments are from the first encounter with the product, meaning that I can miss few things, but I believe you readers will get the picture:
- The limitations on the excel source are way too much: Why the maximum file size is 2M? "The sheet should contain only the data and column headers. Titles,
notes and other text outside of the data table will impede the upload" ? Why can't I take my old familiar excel and use it as is? Com'n guys, write some VBA scripts and work this out.
- When I start from "Create new Widget" and then moving straight to "Create new Data File" because it is my first time, I want to go straight from the end of the data file wizard to when I've been in the create widget wizard. I don't want to start over the create widget wizard.
- Every step in the wizard has a little question mark with it that explains the current part. It is very intuitive, nicely done and nicely put.
- The widgets are very beautiful. As a BI developer, I'd be happy to put some of these on the CEO's dashboard.
- What about multilanguage support? The hebrew columns appears as jibrish in the widgets.
- The publishing process is not simple enought. I don't want to get a script that I need to place in my blogger/facebook/iGoogle. I want that the process will end at the target of the widget. For example, let's say I want to put the widget in my facebook's profile. I would expect that facebook will be open in the end of the wizard and a new Widgenie application will be created on my profile asking me to choose one of the widgets I created.
- The text cloud widget is very simple and powerful. It can be very useful for managers.
For conclusion, Widgenie is a very beautiful product that has a long way to do if it wants to stand with the big sharks of the BI world. It has to fix some issues, support more sources and targets and have more capabilities (snapshots support, SSAS integration, excel-style chart editing and more). I don't know why I can't embed here the widgets (it's just ain't working) so here are links to the
bar chart and the
text cloud widgets.