Adapting Temporal Aspects to Static GIS Models

Abstract

Conventional GIS data models emphasize static representation of real world Geographic features. There are several real world problems where this assumption is not valid. For example the boundary of a lake changes with time depending on the inflow due to rains. The feature’s geometry, its attributes and the topology with respect to its adjacent features are temporal. Current models used in commercial GIS do not support efficient persistence of the temporal history, provide temporal queries and deal with time variant topological changes. Study of current spatio-temporal models has been done and suitable techniques to enhance current spatial models with temporal aspects without breaking existing functionality has been explored. Moving object data model and its variations have been found to be an appropriate candidate for such enhancement. This paper describes the extension of spatial data model and its schema of a commercial GIS tool for supporting moving object data and creation of typical temporal analysis and query commands.