Accomplishing a Goal

Blended with the nonlinearity of hypertext, interactivity helps us to break the intellectual stranglehold of the print paradigm. Interactivity allows the user to interact with the multimedia system to accomplish a goal or set of goals. That goal may be learning a process, where the user may access a multimedia application to follow a set of interactive instructions. Another goal may be that of winning, as in a situation where the user is engaged in a multimedia game. A third goal may be ordering a product from an online catalog.

People interact with documents, even paper documents. When reading a book or trying to locate information in a manual, people highlight and underline text and write notes in the margins. It helps them focus on their specific goals: learn about and remember the topic.
To help users in a multimedia environment accomplish their goals, it is essential to design effective dialog between the user and the document. To create effective dialog in an electronic document, think about the users' needs and consider the following points:

• Interact with the user
• Do not overload the user
• Make consequences predictable
• Make dialogs efficient
• Integrate hyperlinked information smoothly