Come together....

     As bandwidth increases, new technologies emerge, and users switch to faster modems, true multimedia on the web becomes more of a reality. Very few of the millions of web "surfers" that may visit your site have the luxury of a high speed connection (greater than 56K). This does not mean that multimedia is not an option for you. It simply means there are additional considerations to take into account before you decide to take your first step beyond the realm of "typical" design.

NAVIGATION: YOUR FIRST INTERACTIVE STEP

     While navigation issues have already been addressed to a degree, it is important to remember that your navigational interface is the first "interactive" feature your visitors will encounter. You must carefully decide what degree of complexity you wish to design into such an integral part of your site. If you browse the web for any amount of time, you'll eventually come across a user interface that features some form of animated menu, pop-up selection list, or other eye catching display for choosing pages within a web site. These menus are usually Java applets or scripts, Active X, or other new technology like Macromedia's "Flash" or "Shockwave" applications (discussed later).

     There are many ways of jazzing up your menu system but you always stand the risk of excluding a segment of your viewing public when you rely solely on these navigational approaches. It is extremely important to always offer an alternative to graphic or multimedia based navigation in the form of a simple linked text menu (commonly placed at the top or bottom of each page). Many older web browsers do not support the latest technologies (yes, some people refuse to upgrade their browsers...) and some viewers routinely browse the web with both graphics and Java disabled. These are the "Just the facts" type of people who are not interested in bells, whistles, and pretty pictures. If you are designing a commercial site in particular, alternate text menus are essential in meeting the information and service needs of the widest possible audience.

USING SOUND FILES IN YOUR PAGES

     One of the first "multimedia" elements a new web designer learns to use (or abuse...) is sound files. These typically come in two flavors... Midi's and Wav's. Like graphics, you should seriously consider the file size of your sound files when implementing them into your pages. Sound files can be embedded into a page so that they play automatically or you can create links to the files allowing the visitor to "choose" whether they want to listen to the file or not (in my opinion, the better approach).

JAVA AND JAVASCRIPTS

     Java is perhaps the most widely used multimedia element on the web today. Java applets are small "programs" embedded in the source code of the HTML document. When the page loads, the program is downloaded and runs on the visitors computer as part of the web page. A Java script is similar. The difference is that a script places the programming code directly into the document source as part of the HTML rather than as a separate, "independent" element. Java offers the designer the opportunity to provide complex animation and interactivity in the form of games, quizzes, site utilities, audio and visual effects, and much more.

     One of the more interesting uses for applets is in the form of games. Complex control methods somewhat defeat the purpose of interactive media so choose your applets wisely. Games are not the only use for applets however. Java can be used to add an intuitive interface to just about any application. We'll wrap up our discussion of Java and Java scripting in the second half of this tutorial then take a look at some advanced multimedia techniques.

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