Macromedia's suite was the most complete package of the four. It has a large installed user base, affordable training and an attractive price scheme. However, Hypercosm's 3-D models were superior to Macromedia's. Web Learning Studio illustrates the trade-off between power and accessibility. The development tools support Macintosh and PC platforms, and the objects play anywhere.
Training is necessary.
NYUonline's iAuthor NYUonline's iAuthor, a stickler for metadata tagging, streamlines collaboration by storing all assets in an online database accessible to many during the creation process. Probably the strength of the program. The interface was usable if a bit cluttered. We were impressed with the clear, rigorous way in which iAuthor enforced metadata tagging. Still unclear, however, is how NYUonline will resolve the issue of streaming-media content that resides on external servers because it cannot be encapsulated with the object when it is compiled.