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1) EXTERNAL CONTROL DEVICES BEYOND THE KEYBOARD & MOUSE
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You can almost sense the fustration in Abbots Aerodome and beyond:
Users are tired of having control objects through the keyboard and mouse alone. While this may suffice for an avatar or perhaps even very basic vehicles, I think it'd be nice to interperate buttons and perhaps joystick X/Y/Z (horizontal, vertical and pedals) by creating statements that programmers can work with that are seamless cross platform.
Sadly, I'm aware this is an issue on Macintosh systems (owning both a PC and a Mac myself) since the support for game controllers in OS X is to say the least, almost non-existant and hacked together.
To justify this request?
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Flying any sort of craft in game is a real chore with the keyboard because the degree of control desired simply isn't there. Mouselook is an improvement in leaps and bounds, but again I feel it could still use improvements.
A realistic request:
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It can't be any harder than implementing another X/Y/Z device other than the mouse. Before you start to whine about bandwidth, perhaps the sensitivity could be limited to a number of levels or calculations for the direction and interperetations performed at a user level and not a server level to ease the load on servers.
The goal of this request in the long run:
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To satisfy enthusiasts on many levels and topics and to bring in users who would typically play games, rather than Second Life their own.
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2) STANDARDIZED HUD CLASSES
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Sadly, writing a HUD object is a big hassle and a very inconsistant task. This might have something to do with it's unpopularity.
Perhaps in a later version, there might be standardized classes to make a coders life easier in the long run by taking input from an output variable an object creates and having a standard class or statement to interperate the stream of information in a number of manners pre-prepared for the user.
A few examples might be...
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-Dial (flat)
(dial(s) with an uploaded/chosen image for the dials themselves, the background, options for opacity and a ticker set a layer beneath or above the dials).
Implementation: Spedometers, clocks, altitude meters, compasses, ect...
-Dial (3D)
A further implementation which can be positioned and moved within the HUD prior to actually being fitted. The dial object could either rotate pointers or rotate itself to display to the user something is changing via notches.
(Example: http://i24.photobucket.com/albums/c25/niaosaka/cockpit.jpg)
Implementation: Compass (above, often seen in many games.. North, number of degrees or even location of a chosen target/destination)
More difficult?
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Again, this would mean an underlying framework would have to be written. I don't know if you have the time, but it really depends on if the folks at Liden really want to expand the market for hud objects and make them more accessable.
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USER-MADE WINDOW OBJECTS AKIN TO ALREADY EXISTING
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I started writing for HUD but I realized this could be an implementation of it's own.
Wouldn't it be nice if users could write fully fledged applications as well as objects into SecondLife?
-Windows, akin to those seen in Second Life's interface
While not exactly the same, I'm sure a system could be made for users to put together their own applications, though it would be nice to be able to press tab and move through available options or cycle user-made and included windows via a keyboard combination, since it's a serious hassle to get anything like this done in mouseview.
Implementation: Skies the limits, folks.
Are you mad?
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Unfortunately, no. I assume the good people who wrote SecondLife did it in an Object Orientated manner so the objects that make up the window objects (and no, not the slider thing that appears on the right) are already in place:
All the developers would have to do is implement them in such a way that users can access them.
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FINAL THOUGHTS
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I realize the requests become harder as one goes down the list, but even implementing one would be great for everyone.
Thanks for your time.