The evolving technologies of computers, communications, and digital hypermedia have provided new vistas for the design of learning environments. Multimedia presentations can be used, for example, with video, high resolution graphics, and animation to allow a student to better visualize physical and logical events, as well as relationships among phenomena and parts of a system, equipment or problem. However, with all that functionality and potential gain comes a hardware and software technology that has advanced faster than the instructional technology decision aids needed to support multimedia learning environments. In particular, there is a significant lack of tools to support the decision making needed for analyzing multimedia options and conducting trade-offs to decide optimum solutions. Those solutions must not only be based on sound principles, theoretically framed and empirically validated, of cognition, learning and pedagogy but also must consider parameters of cost, benefits, logistics and infrastructure to make the learning system viable. A tool that has intelligence to automate support of trade-off decisions for multimedia instruction is needed to ensure proper return on investment.

The work to be described was completed under a Small Business Innovation Research contract, Phase I, and was formulated with the objective of defining a basis for the Phase II development and fielding of a computer based tool for performing trade studies on multimedia. The Phase I effort focused on specification of an intelligent tool that guides practitioners, whatever their level of instructional and media technology or content domain expertise, through the analysis process to determine and document how, when and for whom the multimedia can be used, its logistic impact, life-cycle parameters, and estimated costs/benefits.