To get ready for Longhorn, let's say we want to create an Aero-style Betanews.com headline reader. What would be the fastest, easiest way to do this? The answer: DesktopX Pro.

Here's how you would do it:

Step 1: Load up the DesktopX Development environment

Step 2: Create 3 objects:

You will also need your Aero images. Here is where you can get some Longhorn images from.

Step 3: Assign your images and give each one its own objectID to refer to (summary page) in your script. Drag your various headline text items over to where you want them to be displayed.

Step 4: Get the RSS feed of Betanews.com and write a small script to read it in and parse it.

Step 5: Export it as a gadget (right click on it and select export)

Step 6: All done!

Try it yourself here: http://www.stardock.com/brad/betanews.zip