Stocks widget stopped working mid May 2020

Actually, this whole issue could be an artifact. I just did restart my machine, and it went through some odd phases. After finally getting back up, the Stocks widget is now working normally again. So must have been some corruption.

The "odd phases":

• boot up very slow; my assumption is that the machine decided to run an fsck, which causes a very slow boot up
• instead of starting normally, the apple logo was displayed in a red box, and the progress bar in the "yet to be completed" section was green. I searched for this and apparently it is a known situation, but without a good explanation that I could find. I did however find a picture of a computer with this situation.
• after that, instead of completing the restart, it just locked up
• I had to force shutdown via power switch
• Next restart was normal, and Stocks widget is now working again.

Go figure.

https://www.wired.com/story/dashboard-macos-catalina-rip/

Gone in Catalina, so don't expect the older versions to be supported anymore, once broken, they are gone.

There are new apps for all that, I guess.

Apple "Sherlocked" their own Dashboard. I still miss Sherlock, no kidding!

https://www.howtogeek.com/297651/what-does-it-mean-when-a-company-sherlocks-an-app/

steve obs2 wrote:

I agree w/ you. Mac OS widgets and other features were so less buggy. Now, it's like Bill Gates took over or something. I too want those widgets back. I hate how just one day it stops working w/ no warning.

Many Apple widgets relied on outside data sources and were effectively dependent on those sources. Example: both the weather and stock widgets say "Powered by Yahoo."

When the Stocks widget was acting spotty and people complained about it here, it turned out to be a glitch at Yahoo's end. It worked again for a while but is now dead. Now none of the Yahoo-powered stuff work as far as I can tell. The Movie widget which I really liked was a Fandango product. It's dead too.

I am no happier than you with a certain company's "Hype It, then Heave It" history for useful features, but sometimes the fault is shared.

Au contraire. It is not incorrect. I just checked and it is still working perfectly on both my iMac and my MacBook Pro.

that was at 1:28PM PDT

Have you installed anti-virus software or so-called "cleaning" apps on your Mac? Those can interfere with proper function.

What iMac do you have and what OS version is it running?

This answer is incorrect. The Stocks widget in Notifications simply no longer works for me. You can add it or remove it from Notifications, but you cannot make changes to it, add or remove stocks, or link to Yahoo Finance. Plus the stock values are as they were at some point about a week ago.

The widget in Notifications is just dead.

Oddly, the similar widget in iOS continues to work normally.

I ran AV for about 10 years, then several months ago stopped for unrelated reasons. I do not run cleaning apps due to bad experiences long ago with them doing too much and breaking things. Machine is 2017 27 inch iMac. macOS is 10.15.4.

The Stock widget in notifications worked fine through many evolutions. However last week it stopped working. By that I mean the following

• no updates to stocks
• does not respond to clicks on any of its controls such as "See more on Yahoo ...", "Yahoo Finance", or "Show less".

I just decided to check one other widget that I have: the calculator. It does not respond to keypresses either. So this might be a clue. And I am going to restart the machine right after I post this update.

Here is what is has looked like for a while:

You will note that the controls at the bottom are dimmed.

Several times I have removed it from the Notifications and restored it, as people say this might fix it. But no joy.

Sorry to digress off topic with this sidebar:

https://www.howtogeek.com/277161/how-to-add-gadgets-back-to-windows-8-and-10-and-why-you-probably-shouldnt/

"Windows Desktop Gadgets Were Discontinued Because They’re a Security Risk"

Seems like Apple does not have a monopoly on retiring useful dashboard widgets/desktop gadgets either!

You can put that same information and more into your Notifications pane. Use the "Edit" button at the bottom to set up stocks, weather, calendar items, world clocks, and more, many of which were once available in Widgets:

This is Apple's support document about Notificaitons:

Use notifications on your Mac - Apple Support

I agree w/ you. Mac OS widgets and other features were so less buggy. Now, it's like Bill Gates took over or something. I too want those widgets back. I hate how just one day it stops working w/ no warning.

The Notification panel is a poor replacement of the Stocks widget, and Dashboard in general. With the Dashboard you can view MULTIPLE widgets of the same type, e.g. a Stocks widget for stocks you own, those you are watching, those you sold, etc. It's a powerful at-a-glance view of stocks, and the Dashboard gave you an amazing full-screen view of other information you care about as well. Here's an example of what I mean...taken from a bad market day!

Well put Allan. :)

Hello everyone,

Here is an updated weather widget that works still (5/22/2020)....

https://macintoshgarden.org/apps/fair-weather

Only displays weather in United States unfortunately though.

:-)