> Those who enjoy the nuts and bolts of putting together multimedia
> presentations are not necessarily the same people who can turn out a
> well-designed product. A look at most companies' sales presentations
> reveals that much of what passes for multimedia is, well, butt-ugly.
>
> Perhaps it's simply because many designers are put off by having to
> learn HTML, scripting languages, or the filmic metaphor of
> multimedia authoring programs like Director. Quark Inc. thinks so
> and hopes to capitalize on that reluctance with its new Immedia
> application, which adds intuitive and easy-to-use multimedia
> authoring tools to its XPress page-layout program.
>
> Immedia presentations can contain anything that an XPress page can
> plus animations, video, transition effects, sound, and hypertext.
> Programming in Immedia is a point, click, and drag affair, accessed
> through the floating QuarkImmedia palette: simply define elements
> within the XPress layout as objects, then assign events to those
> objects. For instance, a picture on a page becomes an object that,
> when clicked on, takes the viewer to another page, plays a movie or
> sound, or pops up a text box. Complex actions are programmed using a
> scripting metaphor in which a series of events are linked together �
> but there is no true scripting language to learn.
>
> Intriguingly, Immedia promises to deliver content over the Internet
> without the design restrictions of HTML. To view an Immedia site,
> download the free Immedia Viewer (now available only for Macintosh)
> from the Quark homepage or any Immedia-designed site with a Viewer.
> Access Immedia content by entering the URL directly into the viewer.
> Unlike HTML Web browsers, the Immedia viewer has no interface, so
> when the site loads, all the user sees is the Immedia presentation
> itself just as if it were a CD-ROM, but at those lightning-fast
> online speeds.
>
> While it's not likely that the release of Immedia will lead print
> designers to rise up en masse to claim the Web in the name of
> 37-point Caslon Open Face, it will at least make it easier for them
> to branch out into interactive media.
>
> \- excerpt from [Wired October 1996][1].
* Top DL: QuarkImmedia 1.0 installer floppy disk, as a Disk Copy 4.2
image compressed with StuffIt 5.5.
* 2nd DL: QuarkImmedia 1.0.1 updater, as a Disk Copy 4.2 image
compressed with StuffIt 5.5.
* 3rd DL: QuarkImmedia 1.0 CD-ROM image, with the 1.0 installer and
extras
* 4th DL: QuarkImmedia clip media disk, a small collection of sample
media to play with
Billed as a competitor to both [Macromedia Director 5][2] and [Adobe
Acrobat 3][3], QuarkImmedia was a [QuarkXpress 3.32][4] add-on
intended to help bring desktop publishing into the multimedia age
ushered in by [The 7th Guest][5] and [Myst][6].
It uses a drag-and-drop palette-based approach to multimedia
scripting, as the Quark-acquired [mFactory mTropolis][7] did before
it.
Regrettably, this product arrived in late 1996, just when [Flash was
getting started][8], the multimedia boom had peaked, and the dot-com
boom was straight ahead.
It received a few minor updates, followed by a 1.5 update on CD-ROM in
1999, and was promptly forgotten soon after.
Compatibility
Architecture: 68k PPC
* QuarkXPress 3.32 or QuarkXPress Passport 3.32
* Adobe Type Manager
* System 7.1 or later
* Sound Manager 3.1
* QuickTime 2.1
* 68030 or better, including PowerPC
* 8-bit monitor
* CD-ROM drive
* 4 MB of free RAM.
[1]:
https://www.wired.com/1996/10/beta-30/
[2]:
http://macintoshgarden.org/apps/macromedia-director-5
[3]:
http://macintoshgarden.org/apps/adobe-acrobat-30
[4]:
http://macintoshgarden.org/apps/quark-xpress-332r2-plus-xtensions
[5]:
http://macintoshgarden.org/games/the-7th-guest
[6]:
http://macintoshgarden.org/games/myst
[7]:
http://macintoshgarden.org/apps/mtropolis
[8]:
http://macintoshgarden.org/apps/futuresplash-animator-macromedia-flash-10