Looking for a list widget

Hi there.

I wondered if someone who is knowledgeable and magic with PHP Code could build a widget that not only would help me but, I am sure, would help other webmasters who could use this plugin.

I have looked all over the wibbly wobbly web and can not find my requirment anywhere.

OK what am I looking for? A Document List Widget

We list on some of our websites, Newsletters, Agendas and Minutes all in PDF. At the moment we have the list on pages, but they could go on posts.

Now, what I am looking for is a sidebar widget that can take the top 3 for example and list them in the widget which could be seen all over the site.

I have tried using some “post widgets” and limiting the number of words, but that is no good, because if new item is added with a different name to all goes pair shaped.

So here are my thought – Could there be a way of listing a number of lines of text and wrapping them in some code or by adding a short code to the top of the page that will only read a small number of lines, maybe within a p, ul or li? The line/list would have a date and a link to a PDF File or Page/Post.

I am sure there is a smart dude somewhere out there that can help.

Thanks for taking the time to read this message.

Have a good enjoyable day, learn lots and pass on your knowledge.

Kind regards
John