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Data models – progress towards their description using EXPRESS
Author(s) -
BUCHANAN HUGH
Publication year - 1996
Publication title -
transactions in gis
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.721
H-Index - 63
eISSN - 1467-9671
pISSN - 1361-1682
DOI - 10.1111/j.1467-9671.1996.tb00038.x
Subject(s) - computer science , set (abstract data type) , data model (gis) , data set , object (grammar) , data science , data modeling , interpretation (philosophy) , data mining , information retrieval , information model , database , artificial intelligence , programming language
Data models are used in conjunction with geographic information. However, the tools for describing such data models have been limited in their capabilities. Data description languages that have been developed elsewhere offer a set of tools for describing data models for geographic information. One of these languages is EXPRESS, which has recently been used for describing geographic information data models in a project concerned with creating a European standard for geographic information data exchange. This paper discusses three of the important issues that need to be addressed to utilize EXPRESS with geographic information. The first was whether to characterize real world phenomena as features classified by their geometric characteristics or alternatively whether to characterize them as named object types. The second was whether to insist that all data conformed to a common semantic data model, or whether to leave this flexible in order to minimize the restrictions on users, and thereby encourage use. Finally, a method was required to ensure that the EXPRESS description of a dataset is always associated with the data set itself, and therefore that the interpretation of the data set is made with all available information.