Early experiences in measuring multimedia systems development effort

The development of multimedia information systems must be managed and controlled just as it is for other generic system types. This paper proposes an approach for assessing multimedia component and system characteristics with a view to ultimately using these features to estimate the associated development effort. Given the different nature of multimedia systems, existing metrics do not appear to be entirely useful in this domain; however, some general principles can still be applied in analysis. Some basic assertions concerning the influential characteristics of multimedia systems are made and a small preliminary set of data is evaluated.UnpublishedAlbrecht, A.J. (1979), “Measuring application development productivity”, in Proceedings IBM Application Development Symposium, Monterey CA, 83-92. Beautement, P. (1991), “Review of interactive video systems and their possible application to training in the 90’s”, Interactive Learning International, 7, 45-54. Boehm, B. (1981), Software Engineering Economics, Englewood Cliffs NJ, Prentice Hall. England, E. and Finney, A. (1996), Managing Multimedia, Harlow, Addison-Wesley. Gao, X. and Lo, B. (1996), “A modified function point method for CAL systems with respect to software cost estimation”, in Proceedings of the Software Engineering Conference SE:E&P’96, Dunedin, New Zealand, 125-132. Jeffery, D.R. and Low, G. (1990), “Calibrating estimation tools for software development”, Software Engineering Journal, 5(4), 215-221. Gruskin, L. (1994), “Multimedia consulting”, in Keyes, J. (ed), The McGraw-Hill Multimedia Handbook, New York, McGraw-Hill, 24.1-24.11. Marshall, I.M., Samson, W.B. and Dugard, P.I. (1994), “A proposed framework for predicting the development effort of multimedia courseware”, in Kappe, F. and Herzner, W. (eds) Multimedia/Hypermedia in Open Distributed Environments, Springer-Verlag, 161-180. Merrill, M.D., Li, Z. and Jones, M.K. (1991), “Limitations of first generation instructional design”, Educational Technology, 30(1), 7-11