A Spatial Data Model for Moving Object Databases

Abstract

Moving Object Databases will have significant role in Geospatial Information Systems as they allow users to model continuous movements of entities in the databases and perform spatio-temporal analysis. For representing and querying moving objects, an algebra with a comprehensive framework of User Defined Types together with a set of functions on those types is needed. Moreover, concerning real world applications, moving objects move along constrained environments like transportation networks so that an extra algebra for modeling networks is demanded, too. These algebras can be inserted in any data model if their designs are based on available standards such as Open Geospatial Consortium that provides a common model for existing DBMS’s. In this paper, we focus on extending a spatial data model for constrained moving objects. Static and moving geometries in our model are based on Open Geospatial Consortium standards. We also extend Structured Query Language for retrieving, querying, and manipulating spatio-temporal data related to moving objects as a simple and expressive query language. Finally as a proof-of-concept, we implement a generator to generate data for moving objects constrained by a transportation network. Such a generator primarily aims at traffic planning applications.