Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger or later is required. If your using Safari, click the download link. When the widget download is complete, show Dashboard, click the Plus sign to display the Widget Bar and click the widgets icon in the Widget Bar to open it. If your using a browser other than Safari, click the download link. When the widget download is complete, unarchive it and place it in /Library/Widgets/ in your home folder. show Dashboard, click the Plus sign to display the Widget Bar and click the widgets icon in the Widget Bar to open it.

The Calorie Tracker widget requires an internet connection to work. Why? Well because it has to access the database which is online. Once an internet connection is established press Command + R on your keyboard to reload the widget.

To use the food list simply select a food item after searching for the food of your choice. Once done you will see an overview of the food you have selected. Here you can set the quantity of the food, and the serving size as well. You can see a graph of the food and see all of its nutritional data. Once you are happy with your choice drop down the select menu and choose "Add to list" to add the item to your food list. It will multiply the food calories per the quantity you have selected and it will automatically appear in your food list.

To search for a food simply type the food name or category into the search field in the top right hand corner of the widget and press enter. To get better search results try searching for a broad food name rather than a company name. For example I want to find Jimmy Dean Sausage, if you type in Jimmy Dean you will get no results rather, if you search for Sausage, then you will get more results. The foods are listed as foods not as corporate names for the foods. Once you press enter the widget will auto populate with food choices for you to choose from. Click on a food item to view its Nutrition Facts, press the black arrow button on the top left hand corner to return back to your list. To clear the list press the "X" button located inside the search field.

To view your food graph simply press the graph icon in the lower left hand corner of the widget. Here you can see the total amount of calories, fat, etc.. for the food items in your food list. This graph also splits food items between foods in the food database and foods that you have added so to reduce confusion and to improve accuracy.

To do this search for a food item and view its data. Once here choose the "Download as .TXT" or "Download as .CSV" from the drop down select menu. The food item will appear on your desktop and you can parse it by using Excel, Numbers or any other system that can read comma seperated values.

The My Dietary Allowance area of the widget shows you the total number of allowed grams per fat, calories, etc.. that you can take in based on a 2000 calorie per day diet. This area lets you toggle between Weekly, Monthly and 3 Month view so you can see if you are on track to meet your weight goals for the current month.

Yes, finally you can add your own food items to the public database. To do so press the plus icon in the lower left hand corner of the widget and fill out the required fields. Once done you will be able to search for your food in the "Public" database, you can switch which database is the current active database by setting that option on th eback of the widget.

If you've encountered a problem and your question is not answered here, please feel free to contact us at jon@jonbrown.org.

Please make sure to mention which version of Calorie Tracker you have.