Vista Rainbar is an easy-to-use sidebar for Windows XP, Vista, and 7.  
 
It has 20 stunning gadgets to decorate your desktop. In addition to the eye-candy, Vista Rainbar gives you the possibility to view weather information, the latest news through RSS, display your wireless network strength and much more straight from your desktop! The skins are also fully customizable, although it does require some time to learn the skinning process.  

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Never used the default Vista sidebar, nor Google's sidebar - I'll give this a try, see how it goes

EDIT: Installing now...

Can't I have the option to have no shortcuts? Please? And is this Rainbar 4.5 or Rainbar 5?

 
Yeah, I'll add it in the next release, with the "(not reccomended)".
 
And it's Vista Rainbar 4.5 Fixed it.
 
Get the latest version from http://koti.welho.com/legace/

Lovely

Oh, and how do I use the Applauncher gadget? Really confusing me

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What do you mean?
Do you want to edit the entries? That requires a bit more knowledge in Rainmeter skinning, but I think you'll figure it out. Just right-click on the gadget, and select Skin Menu -> Edit Skin

Then I shall go figure it out

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How do you change the gadgets?

 
Change the gadgets? What do mean with that?
 
To open new gadgets, double-click on the Vista Rainbar tray icon to open the Gallery. Once you have a gadget open, just hover over the gadget, and click on the > icon that appears

Great work legace ! Thank you for sharing

 
4.5.1.0, which is due shortly, will have a configuration tool for the App Launcher