HEART : A Software Architecture for Distributed Multimedia Multiuser Applications

The distributed multimedia multiuser applications are generally composed of multiple individually-controlled application service elements, which require various complex communication services. In this paper, we present HEART; a software architecture to support distributed multimedia multiuser applications in high-speed networks. The proposed HEART software architecture consists of three layers; the MMCP(Multimedia Multiuser Communication Platform) layer, the CASE(Common Application Service Elements) layer and the target application layer. The MMCP provides structured and dynamically-conngured communication services to the individual applications of CASE layer. And the CASE layer provides various types of basic application service elements which can be exibly conngured and integrated for the development of target applications. The proposed HEART archite-cure will help to develop various distributed multimedia multiuser applications.