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When you first select your preferences and properties in developing a
multimedia demo, you should pay special attention to selecting monitor
resolution and colors. You want to make sure you can reach a broad audience.
If you create a demo at 1280 x 1024, for instance, an audience displaying
that resolution will be able to view that demo as you intended for it to be
viewed. But audiences with monitors displaying lower resolutions, say
800x600, will view a distorted demo. Graphics won't be displayed where you
wanted, and any hotspots created that users could click on might be located
somewhere in the screen shot that was unintentional. If the hotspots were
intended to move the user to another feature or screen in the demo, then the
user has no way to move along. The entire demo could be compromised for an
entire group of people, and some may have no idea how to change their
display capabilities.
Once you select a resolution and colors, you might want to provide
information with the demo disk that indicates the optimal setup for running
the demo.
In addition, you want to make sure that a demo created in Windows 3.1 or
Windows 95 can be used on both platforms. If not, add that to the setup
information included with the demo disk.
And test, test, test... to make sure everything is running smoothly.
----------
>From: geoff-h -at- MTL -dot- FERIC -dot- CA
>To: HQ1/HQ1POBG/mpcdxm; TECHWR-L
>Subject: Multimedia demos
>Date: Thursday, June 05, 1997 1:40PM
>
> Multimedia demos can be very effective indeed, but there
> are a few caveats. First, test the demo carefully on a
> selection of machines _outside_ your company. I've stopped
> counting the number of demos, tutorials and the like that I
> simply couldn't run on my computer, with no reason given
> other than a cryptic error message or a system crash.
> Second, make sure you ship all the necessary components
> with the demo (see step 1!). I've also stopped counting the
> number of times that the demo assumed I had QuickTime X.0,
> a specific font, or a specific utility installed on my
> computer, when in fact I didn't and had no easy way of
> obtaining the utility.
>
> You'd think this would be simple common sense, but based on
> my experience, it's not something to take for granted.
>
> --Geoff Hart @8^{)} geoff-h -at- mtl -dot- feric -dot- ca
> Disclaimer: Speaking for myself, not FERIC.
>
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>From: geoff-h -at- MTL -dot- FERIC -dot- CA
>Subject: Multimedia demos
>To: TECHWR-L -at- LISTSERV -dot- OKSTATE -dot- EDU
>
>
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