Google Gadgets for Linux provides a platform for running desktop gadgets under Linux, catering to the unique needs of Linux users. It’s compatible with the gadgets written for Google Desktop for Windows as well as the Universal Gadgets on iGoogle. Following Linux norms, this project is open-sourced under the Apache License.

Here’s 5 easy step for installing google-gadgets for linux from source.
note: I’m using google-gadgets version 0.10.3 on Ubuntu 8.10 Machine.

1. Download source package from google-gadget site:

http://code.google.com/p/google-gadgets-for-linux/

http://google-gadgets-for-linux.googlecode.com/files/google-gadgets-for-linux-0.10.3.tar.bz2

2. Install mandatory packages:
$ sudo apt-get install build-essential zip flex desktop-file-utils shared-mime-info zlib1g-dev libgtk2.0-dev libxml2-dev libdbus-1-dev librsvg2-dev libltdl3-dev libcurl4-gnutls-dev libgstreamer-plugins-base0.10-dev xulrunner-1.9-dev network-manager-dev libqt4-dev libstartup-notification0-dev

3. Enter to your google-gadget download directory, and extract the file.
$ tar jxf google-gadgets-for-linux-0.10.3.tar.bz2
$ cd google-gadgets-for-linux-0.10.3

4. Create `build` dir, and configure
$ mkdir build
$ cd build
$ ../configure –prefix=/usr