METHODOLOGIES FOR DESIGNING AND DEVELOPING HYPERMEDIA APPLICATIONS

Hypermedia design, as any other design activity, may be observed according to two points of view: methods which suggest milestones to guide the designer's work and process which concerns the actual detailed behavior of the designer at work. Cognitive studies assess that mental processes involved in any design process show widely shared human characteristics regardless to the used design method. Thereby, they provide general keys to help designers. Thus, a hypertext design environment should equally consider the two dimensions of a hypertext design activity, in particular it should support the natural design process specificities, mainly the incremental and opportunist aspects. The paper focuses on the hypertext design as a computer supported human activity. It examines what is general both in the design methods and in the design process of hypertexts in order to determine which general features are helpful to designers. This analysis has raised from the observation of the behavior of MacWeb users during design tasks. It is related to sound and well known results in cognitive science. The paper also describes how the proposed features are implemented in the MacWeb system.Information Systems Working Papers Serie

HyperManual a hypermedia construction and browsing system in Smalltalk/V Mac

The process of locating needed information in a paper document is often frustrating and time consuming. The information may be available but, since the basic access method is often linear, the information is not readily available. Hypermedia systems offer a computer-based mechanism that can simplify the search process and increase the ratio of useful information found to time expended. Such systems also support the creation of alternate views on the same data base of information. This thesis describes some current hypertext systems and the overall structure of the HyperManual system. This system includes both the tools needed to create and traverse a web of links within a database of documents, and an environment that supports these link construction and information browsing activities. The system differs from other hypermedia systems in that it provides a variety of modes of access to the documents in a hyperdocument. The HyperManual system was written in Smalltalk/V for the Macintosh

Educational hypermedia resources facilitator

Se analiza el impacto que la enseñanza en web ha tenido en la educación superior y las distintas herramientas que permiten la creación de documentos hipertexto como recursos de enseñanzaWithin the university the introduction of computers is creating a new criterion of differentiation between those who as a matter of course become integrated in the technocratic trend deriving from the daily use of these machines and those who become isolated by not using them. This difference increases when computer science and communications merge to introduce virtual educational areas, where the conjunction of teacher and pupil in the space-time dimension is no longer an essential requirement, andwhere the written text is replaced (or rather complemented) by the digital text. In this article a historical defence is made of the presence of this new standard in the creation of digital educational resources such as the hyperdocument, as well as the barriers and technological problems deriving from its use. Furthermore, HyCo, an authoring tool, is introduced which facilitates the composition of hypertexts, which arestored as semantic learning objects, looking for that through of a simple and extremely intuitive interface and interaction model, any teacher with a minimum knowledge of computer science has the possibility of transforming his or her experience and knowledge into useful and quality hypermedia educational resources

METHODOLOGIES FOR DESIGNING AND DEVELOPING HYPERMEDIA APPLICATIONS

Hypermedia design, as any other design activity, may be observed according to two points of view: methods which suggest milestones to guide the designer's work and process which concerns the actual detailed behavior of the designer at work. Cognitive studies assess that mental processes involved in any design process show widely shared human characteristics regardless to the used design method. Thereby, they provide general keys to help designers. Thus, a hypertext design environment should equally consider the two dimensions of a hypertext design activity, in particular it should support the natural design process specificities, mainly the incremental and opportunist aspects. The paper focuses on the hypertext design as a computer supported human activity. It examines what is general both in the design methods and in the design process of hypertexts in order to determine which general features are helpful to designers. This analysis has raised from the observation of the behavior of MacWeb users during design tasks. It is related to sound and well known results in cognitive science. The paper also describes how the proposed features are implemented in the MacWeb system.Information Systems Working Papers Serie

VALUATION LINKS: FORMALLY EXTENDING THE COMPUTATIONAL POWER OF HYPERTEXT

We view hypertext as an inherently dynamic concept to incorporate in the interface of dynamic information systems. What challenges does hypertext face in a constantly changing environment? In this paper, we discuss the benefits and the problems we face in our research into hypertext-oriented decision support systems. Then we focus on a new hypertext construct beneficial to this domain: valuation links. Valuation links support the dynamic spreading of computation via a well defined link traversal operation. We present two classes of such links: static and dynamic, and specify an algorithm for their traversal. We also show how these constructs can be used in sophisticated DSS environments.Information Systems Working Papers Serie

Disaster planning for Navy ADP systems.

ADP systems have become vital to many Navy activities and thus have created a need for disaster planning which will ensure the continued operation of these systems. However, disaster planning is expensive, long-drawn, and difficult to implement under day-to-day operational commitments. This study analyzes the directives governing Navy ADP disaster planning, presents affordable alternatives, and suggests the need for a Navy support team to assist in the implementation of disaster plans.http://archive.org/details/disasterplanning00hickLieutenant, United States NavyApproved for public release; distribution is unlimited