Multimedia has two fundamental characteristics that can be expressed by
the following formula: Multimedia = Multiple Media + Hypermedia. How can
software engineering take advantage of these two characteristics? Will
these two characteristics pose problems in multimedia systems design?
These are some of the issues to be explored in this book.
The first two chapters will be of interest to managers, software
engineers, programmers, and people interested in gaining an overall
understanding of multimedia software engineering. The next six chapters
present multimedia software engineering according to the conceptual
framework introduced in Chapter One. This is of particular use to
practitioners, system developers, multimedia application designers,
programmers, and people interested in prototyping multimedia
applications. The next three chapters are more research-oriented and are
mainly intended for researchers working on the specification, modeling,
and analysis of distributed multimedia systems, but will also be
relevant to scientists, researchers, and software engineers interested
in the systems and theoretical aspects of multimedia software
engineering.
Multimedia Software Engineering can be used as a textbook in a
graduate course on multimedia software engineering or in an
undergraduate course on software design where the emphasis is on
multimedia applications. It is especially suitable for a
project-oriented course.