The items listed below should be considered as ideas and options only. No definite plans will be committed to at this stage!

More Towers

It has always been a long-term idea (dream?) that Virtual Belfry would present the user with a choice of towers, so that bells from various places can be rung, listened to and enjoyed. The release of version 2.0 is a big step in that direction, with an eight and a twelve now provided.

The next "big step" will be the provision of another new tower, new photography and all, and one that is not St. David's Cathedral, Hobart! This is a formidable amount of work and, being honest, is unlikely to happen.

More Recordings

Unlike new towers, additional recordings are much more achievable. Suitable recording equipment has been purchased. The main drawback is that I live about as far from other towers as it is possible to get! But on future visits to the UK I hope to take recordings of the bells in various towers to add to Virtual Belfry's repertoire.

More options in the Ropes window

The ropes window is rather plain at the moment. This is intentional - the window is designed with the ropesight features in mind and any other details would therefore be a distraction. But the movement of the ropes is quite attractive in its own right and more could be made of this window for the purposes of showing to non-ringers what a ringing room looks like and what ringers have to do.

New Ideas for the "Moving Numbers"

An innovative enhancement to this feature has been imagined. Now it just has to be written.....

Close-up Video

A plan to include close-up video of one bell is under consideration. The idea is to fill the screen with the bell from a side-on perspective and integrate the picture with the manual control feature so that the bell can be rung.

Real Manual Control

Manual control of a bell using the mouse is difficult because of the absence of physical feedback, and it is hard to see how this can ever be improved upon so long as the mouse is the means of input. What is needed is a custom device that provides not only the input into the computer, but also output of some sensation of movement (and resistance to movement) by way of feedback. A solution to this problem is on the drawing board but is far from trivial.

Voice?

Virtual Belfry has no voice calls at the moment. This could be remedied subject to demand, but is not currently planned.

Jump Changes

Support for jump changes would be fun, but the implications stretch from extending the place-notation conventions all the way to calculating a new set of forces for all the additional manoeuvres that the bells would be required to perform.