You are on page 1of 5

Hypermedia, Multimedia and Hypertext

Andrea Mio Moncayo Applied Linguistics ESPE

Hypermedia, Multimedia and Hypertext

The aim of this document is to introduce definitions of hypermedia, multimedia and hypertext.

HYPERMEDIA is a set of methods or procedures for writing, designing, or composing content that has text, video, audio, maps, or other means, and also has the ability to interact with users. It is a tool of communication and human interaction. In this sense, a hypermedia space is an area with no physical dimensions, to home, make more powerful and structure peoples activities, such as, among others: Social Networking Platforms, online collaboration, online learning platforms, etc. The term HYPERMEDIA was created by Ted Nelson in 1970 in his book: No more Teacher's Dirty Looks, as a system that responds to user actions, words and graphics pre-ordering systems, and can be freely explored. This system can be edited, plotted, or designed by artists, designers and editors. The first hypermedia system created was the Aspen Movie Map, with the advent of World Wide Web (nowadays the better example of Hypermedia), it won dynamically

disclosure in storage and retrieval of information on home pages or Web sites that link to each other, non-linearity and with multiple files of different formats. To represent a collection of interconnected network files, hypermedia provides users the freedom to surf through dynamic links, using several different not sequential ways.

MULTIMEDIA is used to refer to any object or system that uses multiple means of expression (physical or digital) to present and communicate information, the media can be varied, from text and images, to animation, sound, video, etc. It lets integrate text, numbers, graphics, fixed or moving images, sounds, high level of interactivity and further navigation possibilities throughout different documents. The most important benefit is that the media can enrich the user experience or receiver, making an easier and rapid assimilation of the information presented due to Multimedia communication facilitates understanding and learning, as it is very similar to the direct human communication (face to face). In conversation, the caller observed (which would be equivalent to a video) and listen (audio) while accompanying his words with gestures and body movements (animations). A description of Multimedia by Kozma, he said: "Until recently the term meant the use of several media devices sometimes in a coordinated fashion (e.g., synchronized slides with audio tape, perhaps supplemented by video). However, advances in technology have combined these media so that information previously delivered by several devices is now integrated into one device. The computer plays a central role in this environment." To explain Multimedia, authors use such phrases: interactivity via a computer, the evolving ability of computers to convey diverse type of information, computer controlled presentation, various media controlled by a computer. This list of phrases suggests that Multimedia, now, is an environment to be accessed via a computer.

Types of Multimedia information: Text: unformatted, formatted, linear and hypertext. Graphics: used to represent schemas, maps, line drawings. Images: documents are composed of pixels. Can be generated by copy of the environment (scanning, digital photography) and tend to be very large files. Animation: presentation of a number of graphics per second generated in the observer the sensation of movement. Video: Introducing a number of images per second, which create in the viewer the sensation of movement. They can be synthesized or captured. Sound: can be speech, music or other sounds. Multimedia is classified into linear, interactive and hypermedia depending on the control the user has on the application. Linear Multimedia: when the application moves progressively from beginning to end and the user has no control of it. Interactive Multimedia: when the user can perform actions on the application and click on some objects or buttons that allow you to monitor the progress of the same. Hypermedia: When combined multimedia with hypertext, so, the user is allowed to have more control of the application using buttons, text, images and other objects.

HYPERTEXT is a text, which is on the computer screen and leads to another related text. The most common forms of hypertext documents are automatic hyperlinks or cross-references to other documents. This term was first used in 1960 by Theodore Nelson, who defined it as "a combination of natural language text with the computer's capacity for interactive branching, or dynamic display of a nonlinear text which cannot be printed conveniently on a conventional page". The nonlinear nature of presentation differentiates hypertext from the print material, otherwise both are used as media for instruction; provide information through text, graphics, diagrams, and pictures. It is not limited to textual data, it is possible to find other items such as specified drawings related with the topic, also, sound or video based on the theme. The program used to read hypertext documents called browser, so, when we follow a link, we are surfing Web. Hypertext is one of the forms of hypermedia, focused on design, writing and editing text in a stocking. Hypertext is the grouping of relevant information in the form of nodes. These nodes are then connected together through links. In the case of the hypertext, nodes contain text or graphics.

You might also like