There Goes the Neighborhood: Relational Algebra for Spatial Data Search

Jim Gray; Alexander S. Szalay; Aniruddha R. Thakar; Gyorgy Fekete; William O'Mullane; Maria A. Nieto-Santisteban; Gerd Heber; Arnold H. Rots

arXiv · cs/0408031

There Goes the Neighborhood: Relational Algebra for Spatial Data Search

Jim Gray·Alexander S. Szalay·Aniruddha R. Thakar·Gyorgy Fekete·William O'Mullane·Maria A. Nieto-Santisteban·Gerd Heber·Arnold H. Rots

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Abstract

We explored ways of doing spatial search within a relational database: (1) hierarchical triangular mesh (a tessellation of the sphere), (2) a zoned bucketing system, and (3) representing areas as disjunctive-normal form constraints. Each of these approaches has merits. They all allow efficient point-in-region queries. A relational representation for regions allows Boolean operations among them and allows quick tests for point-in-region, regions-containing-point, and region-overlap. The speed of these algorithms is much improved by a zone and multi-scale zone-pyramid scheme. The approach has the virtue that the zone mechanism works well on B-Trees native to all SQL systems and integrates naturally with current query optimizers - rather than requiring a new spatial access method and concomitant query optimizer extensions. Over the last 5 years, we have used these techniques extensively in our work on SkyServer.sdss.org, and SkyQuery.net.

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Jim Gray, Alexander S. Szalay, Aniruddha R. Thakar, Gyorgy Fekete, William O'Mullane, Maria A. Nieto-Santisteban, Gerd Heber, Arnold H. Rots. 2004-08-14. There Goes the Neighborhood: Relational Algebra for Spatial Data Search. https://arxiv.org/abs/cs/0408031

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