New Tools for Multimedia Development: ScriptX

Abstract

Well-implemented multimedia instructional materials have proven to be a cost-effective way to deliver or enhance instruction. Unfortunately, professors who undertake the development of multimedia instructional materials experience a number of frustrations. Unlike desktop publishing, in which the page is a unifying metaphor, there is no metaphor or consistency in multimedia, and cross platform compatibility is rare. Enter ScriptX, a multimedia authoring language, which is implemented on multiple platforms, including Windows, System 7, OS/2, and UNIX. It freely adapts to a number of metaphors, provides capabilities heretofore absent in multimedia tools, and will be generated by many popular authoring programs. ScriptX provides for multimedia benefits of platform and tool independence much like Postscript provides to printing. This presentation, which includes demos, will introduce the audience to ScriptX on a non technical level. It will explain what ScriptX is, how it is implemented, its impact, benefits for faculty authors, and how they can prepare for and take advantage of this new technology. Paper presented at CAUSE94, the full proceedings of which are available through this Library as PUB1094.