An Integrated Computational Model and Programming Platform for Open Distributed Multimedia Applications

It is recognised that distributed multimedia applications introduce new design challenges at all systems levels from network protocols to operating systems to application support platforms. Examples of the new requirements are: the need to represent continuous media [Anderson,90], storage and transmission issues, the realtime synchronisation of continuous media streams and quality of service configurability. This paper investigates issues in the design of a support platform [Davies,91] for distributed multimedia applications which attempts to meet these requirements. The paper is a result of an on-going collaboration between CNET, France and Lancaster University, UK which is attempting to integrate the CNET computational model [Hazard,91] into the Lancaster platform structure [Coulson,92a]. The work of the two groups has been presented separately in previous AV workshops, and is jointly set in the ANSA/ISA [ANSA,89] systems architecture.