Invited Presentation:
What's Special about Spatial?
David J. Abel
CSIRO Division of Information Technology
GPO Box 664
Canberra, ACT 2601, Australia.
abel@cbr.dit.csiro.au
Abstract
Spatial database has been a vigorous niche area within database systems. It
has typically been claimed to be so different that specialised platforms are
needed. This paper analyses the special requirements in terms of data
representation, query processing, access methods and systems architectures
and concludes that convergence of spatial database and mainstream database
is now possible with the emergence of extensible relational and
object-oriented database systems. This suggests that there are particular
opportunities for research and development on embedding spatial database
systems within distributed information systems. A Decision Support System
HYDRA is discussed as a case study of the issues in coupling Spatial
Information Systems with other systems.
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