Spatio-temporal knowledge representation often requires changing from one level of detail to another so users can carry out a desired task. Although abstraction or the opposite task of shifting to more detailed views are routinely and intuitively carried out by humans, formalizing these shifts for integration into information system query languages still offers many challenges. Current geographic information systems (GISs), for example, allow for zooms based on geometric properties only. Similarly, GIS users can change only their spatial perspective of data by panning. This project goes beyond graphic zooming or panning, considering another important perspective--time. A model is introduced to support changes in levels of temporal detail and a new set of operations for temporal panning and zooming are introduced. Temporal panning and zooming result in either simpler views that are easier to understand or more detailed views that uncover information that is otherwise unknown. This work is particularly relevant for the NURI topic of information management for massive databases.
Last updated on September 30, 2000.
[ Geographic Databases | Spatial Database Research Group | NCGIA Maine ]