Description and representation model of spatial object incremental update

Abstract

To efficiently transmit the update of information by the incremental mode, the incremental update of spatial objects is redefined with a combination of the change process and corresponding snapshot delta. A formalization model for representing the snapshot delta is established. By mapping the snapshot delta with the corresponding change process, a typology of the increment which provides preconditions for extracting, representing and merging incremental change is given. A data modelling framework with low redundancy for organizing the increment is introduced. It is shown how useful increments can be queried from such a model using the LOREL query language. Finally, a simplified case study in the application domain of a topographical database update scenario is examined closely. It demonstrates that the new approach is more effective in specific scenarios when the change ratio of the spatial object is relatively low.

Keywords::

• update information
• spatial object
• increment
• spatial databases
• temporal GIS
• snapshot delta and semi-structure

Acknowledgements

This paper is supported by a grant from the National Science and Technology Support Program (No. 2012BAJ23B04) and a grant from National Natural Science Foundation of China (61271257). The authors wish to thank all anonymous reviewers and the editor for their valuable comments on the initial manuscript.