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Fundamentals of Spatial Information Systems

Article · January 1998

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The A.P.I.C. Series
Number 37

Fundamentals of
Spatial Information
Systems
Robert Laurini
Universite Claude Bernard Lyon 1, Lyon, France
and
Derek Thompson
University of Maryland at College Park, College Park, USA

ACADEMIC PRESS
Harcourt Brace & Company, Publishers
London San Diego New York
Boston Sydney Tokyo Toronto
Contents

PREFACE XV
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS xix

PART ONE INTRODUCTION TO THE SPATIAL CONTEXT

Chapter 1 Geomatics: Introduction to spatial information systems 3

1.1 Spatial data organization " 3
1.2 Heterogeneity of uses of spatial information systems 10
1.2.1 Uses of spatial information systems 10
1.2.2 Examples of data requirements 12
1.3 Some components of spatial information systems 16
1.3.1 The toolbox view 16
1.3.2 The physical components 19
1.4 The role of automation: geomatics 19
1.5 Bibliography 24

Chapter 2 Needs: Purposes and types of spatial problem 27

2.1 Problems to be solved; tasks to be performed 27
2.2 Location and character 33
2.3 Measurements and spatial relationships ' 38
2.3.1 Spatial properties 39
2.3.2 Spatial relationships 41
2.4 Categories of spatial problems 43
2.4.1 Types of spatial problem 43
2.4.2 Other aspects 47
2.5 Some examples of multi-faceted needs 48
2.5.1 Example of flows over landscapes 48
2.5.2 Resources inventory 49
2.5.3 Predicting the location of mineral ore deposits 49
2.5.4 Engineering network simulation 53
2.6 Main categories of tools in a spatial information system 54
2.7 Some implications for the design of spatial information systems 58
2.8 Bibliography 59
vi Contents

Chapter 3 Semantics: Objects, surfaces, data 61

/ 3.1 The information in a spatial information system 61
3.1.1 Spatial entities 62
3.1.2 Categories of information 63
3.1.3 Metainformation 67
3.2 Non-spatial attributes 67
3.3 Spatial characteristics of entities 72
3.3.1 Dimensionality of entities 72
3.3.2 Geometric elements 76
3.4 Combinations of entity types 81
3.4.1 Combinations of spatial units 81
3.4.2 Substitutions of spatial units 84
3.4.3 Mixed uses 85
3.5 Continuous variation over and in space 87
3.5.1 A field view of spatial variations 87
3.5.2 Isotropicity 90
3.5.3 Discrete and continuous views 91
3.6 Spatial and non-spatial properties together 92
3.7 An introduction to the mechanics of spatial data organization 95
3.7.1 Tables and matrices 95
3.7.2 Maps . 96
3.7.3 Data models 98
3.8 Personal spatial semantics 99
3.9 Some other aspects of spatial information 102
3.9.1 Data quality 103
3.9.2 The time element 104
3.9.3 Intensional and extensional data 106
3.9.4 General discussion 106
3.10 Bibliography ' 108

PART TWO GEOMETRIES FOR SPATIAL DATA

Chapter 4 Geometries: Position, representation, dimensions 113

4.1 Different geometries 114
4.2 Positioning objects in spatial referencing systems 116
4.2.1 Continuous space referencing 117
4.2.2 Referencing for discrete entities 122
4.3 Global reference systems 127
4.3.1 Global referencing 127
4.3.2 Map projections 128
4.3.3 Some examples of global systems 131
4.4 The fundamental element of distance 134
4.5 Coordinates and splines: the representation of lines 140
4.5.1 Line simplification 141
Contents vii

4.5.2 Smoothed lines 144

4.5.3 Some realities of line and polygon representation 149
/4.5.4 Intensional and extensional representation of objects 151
4.6 Fractals: a way to represent natural objects 152
4.6.1 Creation of fractal objects 152
4.6.2 Stochastic fractals 155
4.7 Space-filling curves and dimensionality 159
4.7.1 Paths through space 159
4.7.2 Space-fillingxurves 161
4.7.3 Dimensionality 167
4.8 Summary 170
4.9 Bibliography 172

Chapter 5 Topology: Graphs, areas, ordering 175

5.1 Networks and graphs 175
5.1.1 Graphs 176
5.1.2 Properties of graphs 180
5.2 Graphs and areas 183
5.2.1 Digital line graphs 183
5.2.2 Topological consistency 186
5.3 Error identification 190
5.3.1 Possible conditions in digital maps 190
5.3.2 Some procedures for checking for errors 192
5.4 Polygons and areas 197
5.4.1 Types of areal spatial unit 198
5.4.2 Containment and coincidence 200
5.5 Data for spatial relationships 206
5.6 Some other considerations and summary 211
5.7 Bibliography 214

Chapter 6 Tessellations: Regular and irregular cells, hierarchies 217

6.1Mosaics, tessellations and lattices 217
6.1.1 Tessellations 218
6.1.2 Lattices 219
6.1.3 Scale and resolution 221
6.2 The geometry of regular tessellations 222
6.3 Fixed spatial resolutions: regular cell grids 226
6.3.1 Data encoding 226
6.3.2 Spatial properties 230
6.3.3 Surface modelling from lattices 231
6.3.4 Structures for grid-cell data 232
6.4 Variable spatial resolution: quadtrees 235
6.5 Hierarchical tessellations for a sphere 243
viii Contents

6.6 Irregular tessellations based on triangles 246

6.6.1 Proximal regions 246
•t 6.(s.2 Triangulation 247
6.7 Implications for spatial information systems 252
6.8 Bibliography 254

Chapter 7 Manipulations: Interpolations, geometric operations,

transformations 257
7.1 Interpolation and extrapolation 258
7.1.1 The interpolation and extrapolation concept 258
7.1.2 Some practicalities 261
7.2 Basic operations on lines and points 264
7.2.1 Line intersections 264
7.2.2 Segment intersections 265
7.2.3 Point-in-polygon procedure 267
7.2.4 Centroid definition 269
7.2.5 Some spatial statistics based on point data 270
7.3 Some operations for polygons 271
7.3.1 Intersection of lines with polygons 272
7.3.2 Union and intersection of polygons 272
7.3.3 Area computation 273
7.3.4 Areal interpolation - 275
7.3.5 Shape measures for polygons 276
7.3.6 Polygon clipping 277
7.3.7 Buffer zones 279
7.3.8 Polygon overlay process 280
7.4 Spatial data transformations 284
7.4.1 Changes in dimensionality 285
7.4.2 Changes in position 286
7.4.3 Conflation 290
7.4.4 Changes in topology 291
7.5 Transformations between regular cells and entities 291
7.5.1 Change to regular cells 292
7.5.2 Change from regular cells to vectors 293
7.6 Access to spatial data 295
7.6.1 Access by identifiers and by locators 295
7.6.2 Rectangles and strip trees 296
7.6.3 Sheets and tiles 299
7.6.4 Different forms of spatialaddress 300
7.7 Summary 302
7.8 Bibliography 303
Contents ix

Chapter 8 Spatial analysis: Attribute data, modelling, integration 306

8.1 . Integrating the attribute data 306
8.2 Some operations for planar network entities 310
8.3 Some operation's for grid-cell based map overlay modelling 314
8.3.1 Basic operations for grid-cell data . 314
8.3.2 Spatial modelling with grid-cell data 318
8.4 Operations for quadtree tessellations 321
8.5 Operations for irregular polygons and for graphs 324
8.5.1 Creating regions 325
8.5.2 Location problem solving • 328
8.5.3 Map overlay modelling and analysis 329
8.6 Integration and multiple representation 333
8.6.1 Multiple representation 334
8.6.2 Integration 334
8.6.3 Some examples of public and commercial spatial data
organization 336
8.7 Summary and conclusions 343
8.8 Bibliography 345

PART THREE CONCEPTUAL MODELLING FOR SPATIAL DATA

Chapter 9 Design for Information Systems: Methodologies, issues 351

9.1 Database management systems 352
9.2 The ANSI-SPARC design methodology 358
9.3 Conceptual modelling: the entity-relationship approach 362
9.4 Logical modelling: relational databases 366
9.5 Transforming entity-relationship models into relational models 369
9.6 Logical modelling: CODASYL databases 374
9.6.1 The modelling 374
9.6.2 The data definition and manipulation languages 378
9.7 Some issues in entity-relationship and logical modelling 383
9.7.1 Implied relationships 384
9.7.2 Person-made and natural rules 386
9.7.3 Table organization 388
9.8 The process for the design of spatial information systems 391
9.8.1 The information discovery 391
9.8.2 Information system design 393
9.9 Summary 396
9.10 Bibliography 396
x
Contents

Chapter 10 Spaghetti: Conceptual modelling of line-oriented

objects 399
10.1 Representation of segments, polylines and mixtilines 399
10.1.1 Segments 401
10.1.2 Polylines 402
10.1.3 Representation of a mixtiline 403
10.2 One-dimensional representation of polygons and areas 403
10.2.1 Isolated polygons 405
10.2.2 Sets of polygons 406
10.3 Modelling for graphs 409
10.4 Conceptual modelling of terrains 411
10.4.1 Gradients, grids and contours 411
10.4.2 Triangulated irregular networks 414
10.5 Representation of polyhedra ( 416
10.5.1 Simple polyhedra 416
10.5.2 Complex polyhedra 417
10.6 Some examples of vector oriented geomatic models 419
10.7 Summary 424
10.8 Bibliography 425

Chapter 11 Pizza: Conceptual modelling for areas and volumes 426

11.1 Regular cell grid representation 427
11.2 Quadtrees 428
11.2.1 Review of the concept of quadtrees 428
11.2.2 Modelling polygons and terrains by quadtrees 430
11.2.3 Extended quadtrees 432
11.3 Pyramid models 436
11.4 Modelling via octtrees 436
11.4.1 Hierarchical and linear octtrees 438
11.4.2 Extended octtrees 438
11.5 Example: modelling of geological objects 441
11.6 Summary 442
11.7 Bibliography 443

Chapter 12 Spatial Object Modelling: Views, integration,

complexities 444
12.1 Selection criteria for a good representation 444
12.2 External models: synthesis with different representations 445
12.2.1 Standardization of geometric representation 'N 447
12.2.2 Coexistence of several geometric representations 447
12.2.3 An additional step in conceptual modelling 448
12.3 Working with complex features 453
Contents xi

12.4 Semantic data models 456

12.5 Models used in some spatial information systems and databases 460
i 12.5.1 Commercial spatial information systems software examples 461
12.5.2 National cartographic databases 467
12.6 Issues in representations and conceptual modelling 468
12.6.1 Metadata 469
12.6.2 Database concepts and practical matters 472
12.7 Bibliography 475

PART FOUR SPATIAL DATA RETRIEVAL AND REASONING

Chapter 13 Algebras: Relational and Peano tuple 479

13.1 Features of relations 479
13.1.1 Some properties of tuples 480
13.1.2 The Cartesian product for relations 481
13.2 Relational operators and relational algebra 483
13.2.1 Intersection 483
13.2.2 Union 485
13.2.3 Difference 486
13.2.4 Join 486
13.2.5 Relational projection 487
13.2.6 Restriction 488
13.2.7 Division 488
13.3 Normalization . 490
13.3.1 Necessity for normalization 490
13.3.2 Functional dependencies 492
13.3.3 First normal form 493
13.3.4 Second normal form 495
13.3.5 Third normal form 496
13.3.6 Other normal forms and implications for spatial data 496
13.4 Structured Query Language examples in geomatics 497
13.5 Peano relations 507
13.5.1 Peano relations concept 507
13.5.2 Definition of a Peano relation 509
13.6 Conformance levels and extensions 512
13.6*.l First conformance level: well-positioned object 512
13.6.2 Second conformance level: removal of overlaps 515
13.6.3 Third conformance level: compact objects 516
13.6.4 Extension beyond two dimensions 518
13.6.5 Hilbert keys 519
13.7 The Peano-tuple algebra 520
13.7.1 Boolean operators 520
13.7.2 Geometric operators 523
xii Contents

13.7.3 Relational operators 526

13.7.4 Examples of Peano-tuple algebra queries 530
* 13.8 Summary 531
13.9 Bibliography 532

Chapter 14 Spatial Queries: Types, algorithms 534

14.1 The process for spatial queries 534
14.2 Point-in-polygon queries 537
14.3 Region queries 538
14.4 Vacant place queries 541
14.5 Distance and buffer zone queries 543
14.6 Path queries 546
14.7 Examples of multimedia queries 548
14.8 Implications for spatial information systems 553
14.9 Bibliography . 556

Chapter 15 Access and Quality: Spatial indices and integrity

constraints 557
15.1 Indexing 558
15.1.1 Indexing in file management systems 559
15.1.2 Indexing in relational databases 562
15.2 Spatial indexing 563
15.2.1 Indexing by space-filling curves 567
15.2.2 Indexing by quadtrees 569
15.2.3 Indexing by R- and R + -trees 571
15.2.4 Indexing by other kinds of trees 573
15.2.5 Some practical aspects of spatial indexing 575
15.3 Integrity constraints < 576
15.3.1 Basic integrity constraints 576
15.3.2 Spatial data checking 577
15.3.3 Example of a cadastre 578
15.4 The use of topology in creating integrity checking mechanisms 581
15.4.1 The topology of tessellations 582
15.4.2 The topology of networks 583
15.4.3 The topology of digital terrain models 584
15.5 An example of consistency checking for a terrain model 586
15.5.1 Triangulated irregular network representation 586
15.5.2 Regular cell representation 589
15.6 Conclusions about spatial indexing and integrity 590
15.7 Bibliography 592
Contents

Chapter 16 Hypermedia: Multimedia spatial information

systems and hypermaps 594
16.1 Hyperdocuments 594
16.1.1 Multimedia spatialdata 595
16.1.2 The hypermap concept 597
16.2 Multimedia image data , 600
16.2.1 Image modelling 600
16.2.2 Physical encoding 601
16.2.3 Dynamic image models 604
16.2.4 Picture object modelling for retrieval 604
16.3 Organization of collections of maps and images 607
16.4 Hypermaps 612
16.4.1 Spatial referencing of hyperdocuments 612
16.4.2 Spatial queries for retrieving hypermap nodes 613
16.4.3 Encoding hypermap spatial references by Peano relations 614
16.4.4 R-trees and map pyramids 614
16.4.5 Navigation in hypermaps 616
16.5 Summary 617
16.6 Bibliography 618

Chapter 17 Spatial Knowledge: Intelligent spatial information

systems 620
17.1 Towards intelligent spatial information systems 621
17.2 From record-oriented to object-oriented databases 621
17.2.1 Rationale and objectives 622
17.2.2 Classes, subclasses and instances 624
17.2.3 Attributes and data types 626
17.2.4 Inheritance 628
v
17.2.5 Links between classes and instances 630
17.2.6 Methods 631
17.3 Utilization for geomatics 632
17.4 Object-oriented databases and spatial information systems 635
17.5 Artificial intelligence and expert systems 639
17.5.1 Facts and rules 639
17.5.2 General structure of an expert system 641
17.5.3 Inference engine 642
17.5.4 Metarules 644
17.6 Spatial knowledge representation 644
17.6.1 Spatial facts 645
17.6.2 Spatial relations 645
17.6.3 Spatial metarules 646
17.6.4 Fuzzy spatial knowledge 646
17.6.5 Spatial knowledge from logical deduction 646
17.6.6 Spatial knowledge derived from numerical formulae 648
 xiv Contents

17.6.7 Examples of spatial process representation 649

17.6.8 Visual knowledge encoding 651
/ 17.6.9 Examples in spatial knowledge engineering 653
17.7 Spatial reasoning in spatial information systems 657
17.7.1 Learning possibilities 658
17.7.2 Logico-deductive and spatial reasoning 659
17.7.3 Example of districting 660
17.8 Summary . 665
17.9 Bibliography 667

AFTERWORD 671
INDEX 673

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