Multimedia database systems: Conceptual modeling

Abstract

Multimedia is, without doubt, a key topic for the current and future applications of information technology. Multimedia is being applied to a broad range of applications from education to entertainment and including systems for military and archival and other purposes. The capability to visualize complex information, to view and manipulate video sequences and three dimension animation is a major breakthrough from the traditional text and graphics interactions of conventional information systems. However, most of the research in the multimedia systems field has focused on the development of specific multimedia systems. Part of the reason for this focus is the lack of formal models for specifying multimedia systems and the tools for utilizing those specifications. An attempt to develop a formal conceptual model for multimedia database systems that is independent of the underlying database is the main focus of this work. This model is intended to capture all the requirements of a multimedia system such as different spatial and temporal relationships, synchronization and timing constraints. New symbols that will enable us to construct conceptual models will be introduced.