Konfabulator is a Javsacript-based engine that makes it really easy to create mini applications (they call them “widgets”). First available for the Mac, a lot of people cried foul when Apple shipped similar functionality (called “Dashboard”) in Mac OS X 10.4 (Tiger) a few months ago. By then the Konfabulator guys had ported the application to Windows. And now Macworld is reporting that Yahoo! has bought the company and will give away the app.

Jeffrey McManus, who worked on making it happen, has a note about it on his blog.

This is a pretty smooth move on Yahoo!s part. Given the huge reach this application will have on Windows and Mac (and maybe more, according to the article), I bet all the cool widgets will be developed for Konfabulator first. I can envision a time when even Tiger users are running Konfabulator, due to the enormous about of stuff that will be available for it.

So hey, check it out.