A Multimedia Methodology and Architecture for Computer–Aided Training and Certification

Existing multimedia applications are developed by media production specialists, usually delivered on read–only storage medium (CD–ROM, Videodiscs), exhibit huge initial startup cost, do not provide any intelligent control, require specialized hardware and/or software, modification and upgrades are expensive and time consuming, and are suitable for stable and often generic subject matters. This paper describes MUTANT: a multimedia shell for development of intelligent computer–aided training and certification applications. MUTANT greatly reduces the initial startup cost, allows domain experts to develop the multimedia applications without much dependency on media production specialists, delivers the applications on hard disk or removable storage medium, provides domain experts with efficient tools & techniques for upgrading applications, and provides intelligent control and management of the training and certification process. MUTANT provides the multimedia/hypermedia aspect of ExperMedia/2: an OS/2 Multimedia Expert System shell for domain experts [Hekmat93.3].