Spatial OLAP Systems Research Articles

Current Approaches, Challenges, and Perspectives on Spatial OLAP for Agri-Environmental Analysis

Spatial OLAP (SOLAP) systems are powerful GeoBusiness Intelligence tools for analysing massive volumes of geo-referenced datasets. Therefore, these technologies are receiving considerable attention in the research community and in the database industry as well. Applications of these technologies are current in several domains such as ad marketing, healthcare, and urban development, to name a few. Contrary to other application domains, in the context of agri-environmental data and analysis, SOLAP systems have been underexploited. Therefore, in this paper, the author makes an exhaustive survey of most of the published studies in the domain of the SOLAP analysis of agri-environmental data with an emphasis on the reasons why only few recent works investigate the use of SOLAP systems in the agri-environmental context. In particular, the author focuses on the complexity of the spatio-multidimensional model and its implementation. Moreover, based on surveying the state of the art in this domain, this paper identifies some general guidelines that must be considered by the scientific community to design and implement efficient SOLAP approaches to the analysis of geo-referenced agri-environmental datasets. Finally, open issues about warehousing and OLAPing agri-environmental data are also shown in the paper.

New Design Approach to Handle Spatial Vagueness in Spatial OLAP Datacubes

Spatial-OLAP (SOLAP) technologies are dedicated to multidimensional analysis of large volumes of (spatial) data. Spatial data are subject to different types of uncertainty, in particular spatial vagueness. Although several researches propose new models to cope with spatial vagueness, their integration in SOLAP systems is still in an embryonic state. Also, analyzing multidimensional data with metadata brought by the exploitation of the new models can be too complex and demanding for decision-makers. To help reduce spatial vagueness consequences on the exactness of SOLAP analysis queries, the authors present a new approach for designing SOLAP datacubes based on end-users' tolerance to the risks of misinterpretation of fact data. An experimentation of the new approach on agri-environmental data is also proposed.

Spatial OLAP integrity constraints: From UML-based specification to automatic implementation: Application to energetic data in agriculture

Spatial OnLine Analytical Processing systems (SOLAP) are Business Intelligence technologies allowing efficient and interactive analysis of large spatial data cubes. In this type of systems, the correctness of analysis depends on the warehoused data quality, how aggregations are performed and how data cubes are explored. In this paper, we study quality control techniques (based on integrity constraints) related to exploration of spatial data cubes. We extend our Unified Modeling Language (UML) framework previously proposed with a UML profile allowing the conceptual design of several classes of exploration integrity constraints. We also propose a tool for their automatic implementation. We validate our proposal in the context of a real case study concerning the analysis of energetic farm indicators.

A Generic Spatial OLAP Model for Evaluating Natural Hazards in a Volunteered Geographic Information Context

Spatial data warehouses (SDW) and spatial OLAP (SOLAP) systems are well-known business intelligence technologies that aim to support a multidimensional and online analysis for a large volume of geo-referenced datasets. SOLAP systems are already used in the context of natural hazards for analyzing sensor data and experts' measurements. Recently, new data gathering tools coined as volunteered geographic information systems (VGI) have been adopted especially by non-expert users. Hence, (spatial) application development is facing a new challenge, which is the integration of expert-oriented data with citizen-provided data. In this paper, we propose a new generic spatio-multidimensional model based on the question/answer risk evaluation model that allows the integration of VGI data with classical SDW and SOLAP systems for the online analysis of natural hazards monitored by volunteers.

SOLAP technology: Merging business intelligence with geospatial technology for interactive spatio-temporal exploration and analysis of data

To support their analytical processes, today's organizations deploy data warehouses and client tools such as OLAP (On-Line Analytical Processing) to access, visualize, and analyze their integrated, aggregated and summarized data. Since a large part of these data have a spatial component, better client tools are required to take full advantage of the geometry of the spatial phenomena or objects being analyzed. With this regard, Spatial OLAP (SOLAP) technology offers promising possibilities. A SOLAP tool can be defined as “a type of software that allows rapid and easy navigation within spatial databases and that offers many levels of information granularity, many themes, many epochs and many display modes synchronized or not: maps, tables and diagrams” [Bédard, Y., Proulx, M.J., Rivest, S., 2005. Enrichissement du OLAP pour l'analyse géographique: exemples de réalisation et différentes possibilités technologiques. In: Bentayeb, F., Boussaid, O., Darmont, J., Rabaseda, S. (Eds.), Entrepôts de Données et Analyse en ligne, RNTI B_1. Paris: Cépaduès, pp. 1–20]. SOLAP tools offer a new user interface and are meant to be client applications sitting on top of multi-scale spatial data warehouses or datacubes. As they are based on the multidimensional paradigm, they facilitate the interactive spatio-temporal exploration of data. The purpose of this paper is to discuss how SOLAP concepts support spatio-temporal exploration of data and then to present the geovisualization, interactivity, and animation features of the SOLAP software developed by our research group. This paper first reviews the general concepts behind OLAP and SOLAP systems. This is followed by a discussion of how these SOLAP concepts support spatio-temporal exploration of data. In the subsequent section, SOLAP software is introduced along with features that enable geovisualization, interactivity and animation.