Concepts inApproximation techniques for spatial data
Geographic information system
A geographic information system is a system designed to capture, store, manipulate, analyze, manage, and present all types of geographical data. The acronym GIS is sometimes used for geographical information science or geospatial information studies to refer to the academic discipline or career of working with geographic information systems. In the simplest terms, GIS is the merging of cartography, statistical analysis, and database technology.
more from Wikipedia
Approximation
An approximation is a representation of something that is not exact, but still close enough to be useful. Although approximation is most often applied to numbers, it is also frequently applied to such things as mathematical functions, shapes, and physical laws. Approximations may be used because incomplete information prevents use of exact representations. Many problems in physics are either too complex to solve analytically, or impossible to solve using the available analytical tools.
more from Wikipedia
Query plan
A query plan (or query execution plan) is an ordered set of steps used to access or modify information in a SQL relational database management system. This is a specific case of the relational model concept of access plans. Since SQL is declarative, there are typically a large number of alternative ways to execute a given query, with widely varying performance.
more from Wikipedia
Relational database management system
A relational database management system (RDBMS) is a database management system (DBMS) that is based on the relational model as introduced by E. F. Codd. Most popular databases currently in use are based on the relational database model. A short definition of an RDBMS is: a DBMS in which data is stored in tables and the relationships among the data are also stored in tables. The data can be accessed or reassembled in many different ways without having to change the table forms.
more from Wikipedia
Spatial database
A spatial database is a database that is optimized to store and query data that is related to objects in space, including points, lines and polygons. While typical databases can understand various numeric and character types of data, additional functionality needs to be added for databases to process spatial data types. These are typically called geometry or feature.
more from Wikipedia
Query optimization
Query optimization is a function of many relational database management systems in which multiple query plans for satisfying a query are examined and a good query plan is identified. This may or not be the absolute best strategy because there are many ways of doing plans. There is a trade-off between the amount of time spent figuring out the best plan and the amount running the plan. Different qualities of database management systems have different ways of balancing these two.
more from Wikipedia
Database
A database is an organized collection of data, today typically in digital form. The data are typically organized to model relevant aspects of reality (for example, the availability of rooms in hotels), in a way that supports processes requiring this information (for example, finding a hotel with vacancies). The term database is correctly applied to the data and their supporting data structures, and not to the database management system (DBMS).
more from Wikipedia
Line (geometry)
The notion of line or straight line was introduced by ancient mathematicians to represent straight objects with negligible width and depth. Lines are an idealization of such objects. Thus, until seventeenth century, lines were defined like this: "The line is the first species of quantity, which has only one dimension, namely length, without any width nor depth, and is nothing else than the flow or run of the point which [... ...
more from Wikipedia