Ultima is the latest multi-media program for Acorn machines from Northwest Semerc. Traditionally, Semerc has been a forerunner in the special needs market, but this program is useful for pupils of any age range and ability.

Ultima is content-free, which means that you can basically make a program yourself, with your own pictures and sounds wherever you want them. It’s simple and versatile enough to allow you to make just one screen, customised to the needs of an individual learner, or a “book” of different screens which might tell a story or develop a theme as you turn the pages.

Unless you have already tried some multimedia software (perhaps Genesis or Optima), you will probably be wondering what this jargon means. Unlike most programs, which allow you to create limited types of files (for example a picture, some text or a piece of music), a multimedia program can do all of these and more.

I have found it difficult to get to grips with the technical knowledge involved in creating a multimedia masterpiece, but Ultima changes all that. Within half an hour I had made my own four-page “booklet” and printed it out. This was without even looking at any of the accompanying documentation; surely the acid test of program quality!

So what might you put on a page? If you have access to lots of clip art (that is, pictures saved to disc) or can draw your own pictures on screen, composing a page is as simple as lifting an icon from one window and dropping it on to your blank screen. It is also possible to scan images or use photos from a digital camera. You will need a microphone such as the OakRecorder to add your own voice or sounds to the page you have made, but adding text is simple - click on the text icon near the top of the toolbar at the left of the page, type the word or phrase, and move it to the right place using the mouse.

The Just Pictures range of discs from Semerc, which cover a wide variety of subject and cross-curricular areas, would be a very useful source of reasonably-priced clip art to accompany this program.

Ultima comes on two discs; the first carries the program itself and a clear and simple user guide. This tells you how to start, what you can do with the toolbar, and what the icons represent. Basically, the toolbar enables you to add text, sound and pictures from a picture library, to “bin” things you don’t need, to move between pages or save a page without having to leave the screen or use complicated menus.

The second disc (at least the prototype version that I have seen), is a sample book, which illustrates how you might use the program. Finding my way through the different pages of the story reinforced the information from the user guide, and inspired me to have a go myself. Loading the discs on to a hard drive, if you have one, then making your own directory to save your pages to, will save disc shuffling or running out of room on your floppy discs.

As a teacher in a school for children with learning disabilities, I was pleased to see that Ultima can be accessed by overlay keyboard users, but wondered how the program could work with switches. A built-in page-turn facility would enable single switch users to move through screens of images and sounds, or through a portfolio of record of achievement work.

Northwest Semerc stands SN12A, SN13