Abstract: A method of comparing two multimedia documents includes a three-step registration process. Each document is analyzed to extract concrete or abstract single medium or multimedia elements (meta-segments) from the document. The meta-segments are categorized to identify categories of information in the document. Then, a meta-identifier is produced for the document from the information that identifies the contents of the meta-segments. After registration, traces of the multimedia documents can be compared, without requiring the entire contents of the multimedia documents to be compared.

Abstract: The management system comprises a set of specialized operational units with an acquisition module, a multimedia database, indexing and search agents that can be subdivided into subagents, an agent dedicated to managing information relating to the structure of documents, a module for analyzing and structuring document components, a user interface including a document indexing interface and a document search interface, a module for creating a multimedia database, and a module for opening a session. The management system also comprises a set of specialized functional units with an agent for arranging the various units of the system, agents for driving document indexing and searching, and an identifier manager. A platform provides interconnection and intercommunication between the specialized operational functional units.

Abstract: The management system comprises a set of specialized operational units with an acquisition module, a multimedia database, indexing and search agents that can be subdivided into subagents, an agent dedicated to managing information relating to the structure of documents, a module for analyzing and structuring document components, a user interface including a document indexing interface and a document search interface, a module for creating a multimedia database, and a module for opening a session. The management system also comprises a set of specialized functional units with an agent for arranging the various units of the system, agents for driving document indexing and searching, and an identifier manager. A platform provides interconnection and intercommunication between the specialized operational functional units.

Abstract: The method of comparing two composite multimedia documents, each comprising at least two individual media (images, sounds, video signals, animated vector graphics, or texts), comprises the following steps: a) allocating a meta-identifier to each of the multimedia documents, the meta-identifier being in the form of a weighted hypergraph of nodes and relationships between said nodes and including meta-segments unambiguously identifying individual media making up the multimedia document concerned; b) performing recursion on the secondary tree structures of intra-medium relationships for the individual media of each of the documents; c) for the hypergraph of each individual medium of the document, performing an operation of maximizing matching with the hypergraph of an individual medium of the second document; d) for the hypergraph of each individual medium of the first document, determining the costs of edit operations leading to maximum matching with a hypergraph of an individual medium of the second document,