1. The very existence of links in hypermedia/multimedia conditions the reader or learner to expect purposeful, important relationships between linked materials. 2. The emphasis upon linking materials in hypermedia/multimedia stimulates and encourages habits of relational thinking in the reader. 3. Since Hypermedia/Multimedia systems predispose users to expect such significant relationships among documents, those documents that disappoint these expectations appear particularly incoherent and nonsignificant. 4. The author of hypermedia/multimedia materials must provide devices that stimulate the reader to think and explore. 5. The author of hypermedia/multimedia must employ stylistic devices that permit readers to navigate materials easily and enjoyably. 6. Devices of orientation permit readers (a) to determine their present location, (b) to have some idea of that location's relation to other materials, (c) to return to their starting point, and (d) to explore materials not directly linked to those in which they presently find themselves. Six ways of presenting secondary overviews: (i) Graphic concept map. (ii) Flow chart suggesting vector forces. (iii) Timeline. (iv) Natural object. (v) Outline. (vi) Text as its own overview 7. Authors should consider employing several overviews to organize the same body of material and to assist readers to gain easy access to it. 8. Never place link markers independent of accompanying text or image. 9. When creating a link or positioning a link marker that indicates the presence of a link, remember that all links are bi-directional. 10. Avoid linking to words or phrases that only provide appropriate points of arrival but give the reader no suggestion of where the link might lead on departure. 11. Place the link marker in close proximity to a text that indicates the probable nature of the link destination. 12. When creating documents, assist readers by phrasing statements or posing questions that provide obvious occasions for following links. 13. When possible provide specific information about a link destination by directly drawing attention to it. 14. Linked graphic materials must appear with appended texts that enable the user to establish a relation between a point of departure and that of arrival. 15. The entire text accompanying visual material and not just the opening sentence or two serves as an introduction. 16. The text accompanying an image does not have to specify all relevant information the author wishes the reader to have; rather, emphasizing that a relationship exists at all may be enough. From which follows: 17. Texts serve not only to provide information but also to reassure the reader that the link embodies a significant relationship and to provide some hint, however, incomplete, of how that relationship can be formulated by the reader. 18. When creating documents for hypermedia/multimedia, conceive the text units as brief passage in order to take maximum advantage of the linking capacities of hypermedia/ multimedia. 19. When adapting for hypermedia/multimedia presentation documents created according to book technology, do not violate the original organization. However, when the text naturally divides into sections, these provide the basis of text blocks. The hypermedia/ multimedia version must contain linkages between previous and following sections to retain a sense of the original organization. (Refer to:) Landow, George P. (1990) The Rhetoric of Hypermedia: Some Rules for Authors, The MIT Press.
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