HYPERTEXT, HYPERMEDIA AND MULTIMEDIA

Defferences and uses

WHAT IS HYPERTEXT?
This term refers to textual links that are shown on a website and that normally are blu-colored and underlined. Once the user selects it or clicks on it, they will be taken to another page with the information that the link provides. Hypertext will only be able to link sources of written texts.

EXAMPLE OF HYPERTEXT
Hypertext is a text displayed on a computer display or other electronic device with references (hyperlinks) to other text that the reader can immediately access, usually by a mouse click, keypress sequence or by touching the screen.
*Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypertext

On the text above the orange letters are created as hypertexts so that if the user requieres more information on hyperlinks all they have to do is click on the word hyperlink and a new page will be displayed.

WHAT IS HYPERMEDIA
Hypermedia allows to link not only texts but also images, sounds, animation or videos. It is easy to see in may web dictionaries that next to a word readers might find a small speaker-like figure. If they select this figure the computer will then produce a sound which would be that of the word that is next to it.

EXAMPLE OF HYPERMEDIA
Phonology noun /fnl..di/ /fn.l-/ Definition The study of sounds in a particular language or in languages generally phonological.
*source: http://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/british/phonology?q=phonology

In the dictionary extract above, you can see a samall speaker next to the phonological representation of the word phonology. If the reader clicks on it, they will be able to hear how the word phonology is pronunced.

WHAT IS MULTIMEDIA
This last term is very simmilira to hypermedia, since it involves linking images, videos, sounds and texts. The difference here is that these links are selected based on the ideas of the designer of the page and not always meet the necessities of the reader

EXAMPLE OF MULTIMEDIA
Mr Sticky No one knew how Mr. Sticky got in the fish tank. "He's very small," Mum said as she peered at the tiny water snail. "Just a black dot." "He'll grow," said Abby and pulled her pijama bottoms up again before she got into bed. They were always falling down. In the morning Abby jumped out of bed and switched on the light in her fish tank. Gerry, the fat orange goldfish, was dozing inside the stone archway. Jaws was already awake, swimming along the front of the tank with his white tail floating and twitching. It took Abby a while to find Mr. Sticky because he was clinging to the glass near the bottom, right next to the gravel. At school that day she wrote about the mysterious Mr. Sticky who was so small you could mistake him for a piece of gravel. Some of the girls in her class said he seemed an ideal pet for her and kept giggling about it. *Source: http://www.eastoftheweb.com/short-stories/UBooks/MrStic.shtml

On the short extract from the tale Mr. Sticky, the reader can see how the word GOLDFISH is underlined and blue-colored indicating that if wished the reader can click on it and a new page about goldfish will be displayed. Unfortunatelly the young reader may not be interested in reading about goldfish more than seeing images of the little fish. In this case multimedia is not meeting the needs of the reader but has created a link that to the designers beliefs is of interest to the reader.

CONCLUSION
These three terms offer a new and easier way of learning, since they can help any user have more information on any topic if used correctly. Links help users to easily research topics of interest or sometimes come across topics that they might not have been searching for, but that once seen can be of great help to understand what they were searching for in the first place.