Evolutionary authoring tool for adaptive hypermedia with multimodal navigation

Abstract

This paper discusses the importance of user adaptation and software evolution in hypermedia applications, and reviews some of the most relevant approaches to both fields. The paper describes a model that has been conceived for the development, maintenance and navigation of adaptive hypermedia systems. This model, called SEMantic, systemic and evolutionary model to develop HyPermedia systems (SEM-HP), includes an incremental design process, a layered architecture and an authoring tool integrated with a navigation tool. SEM-HP architecture is composed of four subsystems, which allow the separation of aspects related to knowledge representation, presentation, navigation and user adaptation. In addition, SEM-HP has a higher layer, which acts as a meta-system and allows a consistent evolution of the elements defined in each of the four subsystems, as well as their automatic co-evolution. Regarding user interaction, four alternative ways of navigating hypermedia information are supported. Finally, the paper shows the main results of two case studies carried out with the authoring and navigation tool, JSEM-HP, at the University of Granada, Spain.

Keywords:

• Hypermedia navigation
• User adaptation
• Software evolution
• Authoring tools

Acknowledgements

This research is supported by the Ministry of Science and Innovation (Spain) as part of VIDECO project (TIN2011-26928), the andalusian research program under the project P11-TIC-7486 and the iberoamerican network (U-CSCL) (project CYTED, 51RT0481).