Supporting multimedia information presentation in a distributed, heterogeneous environment

A design overview of a distributed object-oriented system is given which supports the distributed processing of multimedia information with special regard to information presentation in an environment of heterogeneous networks and workstations. Essential features of the system are an object model designed for the handling of multimedia information and the adaptation of presentation and transport of multimedia information to the capabilities and available resources of the workstations and underlying networks. This adaptation is done by a distributed support layer. Using environment information, this layer makes an information presentation and transport service available to the applications