I have a useful sidebar gadget on my Vista PC called "XIRRUS" which monitors my wireless network, giving me %signal, and showing other useful stuff.

As it looks like I may have to use my XP Computer wirelessly, I have set up a USB dongle, and would like to install this Xirrus softwarre on the XP Computer.

I have downloaded it

http://mac.softpedia.com/get/Dashboard-Widgets/Webcams/Miscellaneous/Xirrus-Wi-Fi-Monitor.shtml

(says it's for Vista/XP) and it has downloaded as "Xirrus-WiFiMonitor.widget" My XP machine won't open the file. Can anyone help. I have done the "Windows can't open this file" bit, but all I seem to get is "Free Registry Cleaners"

Thanks in advance - Dave

Having a look around, I get the impression that you need to download an application from "Yahoo Widgets" in order to run them in XP, but I could be way off the mark.

http://widgets.yahoo.com/download/

Thanks for that information, I have gone one step furthur (in this instance) and remembered that I had emailed the guy that wrote the program.

I emailed him again, and he has mailed me this:

For XP, you must load the Yahoo widget framework first before running the Xirrus XP widget.

XP does not have a native gadget/widget framework like Vista, but there are various 3rd party framework options by Yahoo, Google, etc.

Alternatively, check out the new Wi-Fi Inspector which runs as a full app (not a gadget/widget mini-app) and is supported on both Vista and XP.

Links to all the above, including the Yahoo framework and user guides, are on the Xirrus web site at: http://www.xirrus.com/library/wifitools.php

I have downloaded the new "Wifi Inspector" and will give that a try.

again - Thanks - Dave