Yahoo updated its Widgets platform in a move that aims to encourage more developers to embrace Yahoo’s take on the small applications.

Previously known as Konfabulator, Yahoo! Widgets represents a free application platform for Microsoft Windows and Mac OS X thanks to which people are able to create, find and install the so-called desktop widgets, which are in fact small applications or controls that a computer user interacts with every day.

One of the most important new things that the recent update brought for Yahoo’s Widgets platform is the fact that it accommodated Adobe’s new Flash multimedia display technology. Another important improvement that is featured in the update is represented by a new version of the Yahoo Widget Engine, which is a runtime environment that lets widgets to run on a desktop. Yahoo Widget Engine 4.5 features extended HTML support and it adds as well capabilities for developers to write Flash-based widgets.

"What we're seeing is authors are wanting to write movies and video, and that's a new capability that can now add to desktop widgets," said Scott Derringer, Yahoo’s director of product management.

Derringer stressed also on the new domains where widgets could be used. While until now widgets seemed to be primarily consumer-focused, according to Derringer, there could be also business uses for these small applications, such as running of training videos, for example. However, until starting a business as a widgets developer, many of us should first understand what a widget does exactly. Yahoo’s Widget Engine 4.5 is now able to offer an enhanced security model to give users a better understanding of what widgets do.