Chapter 3

GIS Data Model Vector Data model

A. INTRODUCTION Vector data model based on vectors (as opposed to space-occupancy raster structures) fundamental primitive is a point objects are created by connecting points with straight lines some systems allow points to be connected using arcs of circles areas are defined by sets of lines the term polygon is synonymous with area in vector databases because of the use of straightline connections between points very large vector databases have been built for different purposes vector tends to dominate in transportation, utility, marketing applications raster and vector both used in resource management applications B. "ARCS" when planar enforcement is used, area objects in one class or layer cannot overlap and must exhaust the space of a layer every piece of boundary line is a common boundary between two areas the stretch of common boundary between two junctions (nodes) has various names edge is favored by graph theorists, "vertex" for the junctions chain is the word officially sanctioned by the US National Standard arc is used by several systems arcs have attributes which identify the polygons on either side these are referred to as "left" and "right" by reference to the sequence in which the arc is coded arcs (chains/edges) are fundamental in vector GIS

Storing areas two ways of storing areas: polygon storage every polygon is stored as a sequence of coordinates although most boundaries are shared between two adjacent areas, all are input and coded twice, once for each adjacent polygon the two different versions of each internal boundary line may not coincide difficult to do certain operations, e.g. dissolve boundaries between neighboring areas and merge them used in some current GISs, many automated mapping packages arc storage every arc is stored as a sequence of coordinates areas are built by linking arcs only one version of each internal shared boundary is input and stored used in most current vector-based GISs C. DATABASE CREATION database creation involves several stages: input of the spatial data input of the attribute data linking spatial and attribute data spatial data is entered via digitized points and lines, scanned and vectorized lines or directly from other digital sources once the spatial data has been entered, much work is still needed before it can be used Building topology once points are entered and geometric lines are created, topology must be "built" this involves calculating and encoding relationships between the points, lines and areas this information may be automatically coded into tables of information in the database 3

Editing during this topology generation process, problems such as overshoots, undershoots and spikes are either flagged for editing by the user or corrected automatically automatic editing involves the use of a tolerance value which defines the width of a buffer zone around objects within which adjacent objects should be joined tolerance value is related to the precision with which locations can be digitized these edit procedures include such functions as snap, move, delete, split, join, etc. Relationship between digitizing and editing digitizing and editing are complementary activities poor digitizing leads to much need for editing good digitizing can avoid most need for editing both can be very labor-intensive the process used to digitize area objects can affect the need for later editing: in "blind" digitizing all linework is digitized once as "noodles" in any order it is unlikely that the building and cleaning operations will be able to automatically sort out area objects unambiguously from the resulting jumble some systems require the user to identify junctions between digitized "noodles" explicitly usually by touching a special button on the cursor mistakes in building topology are less likely some systems require the user to digitize each individual arc/chain separately much easier to sort out polygons - less need for editing some systems support the building of topology "on the fly" the system searches constantly for complete area objects as digitizing proceeds the user is informed by a sound or by blinking as soon as the object is detected

Edgematching compares and adjusts features along the edges of adjacent map sheets some edgematches merely move objects into alignment others "join" the pieces together logically - conceptually they become one object the user "sees" no interruption an edgematched database is "seamless" - the sheet edges have disappeared as far as the user is concerned D. ADDING ATTRIBUTES once the objects have been formed by building topology, attributes can be keyed in or imported from other digital databases once added to the database, attributes must be linked to the different objects attributes can be linked by pointing to the appropriate object on the screen and coding its corresponding object ID into the attribute table unlike many raster GIS systems, attribute data is stored and manipulated in entirely separate ways from the locational data

GIS Components
There are two basic types of map information in a GIS: SPATIAL and DESCRIPITIVE - Spatial refers to geographic features that are represented as POINTS, LINES, and POLYGONS. Descriptive refers to TABULAR DATA which records characteristics of the geographic features.

Point
Defined as a single x,y cordinate used to describe a geographic feature. the point is the simplest type of spatial object. Choice of entities which are represented as points depends on the scale of the map/study. on a large scale (small area) maps building can be encoded as point locations. On a small scale map (large area) cities can be encoded as point locations. Information on a set of points can be stored in an attribute table. Each row in the attribute table relates to one point each column is an attribute

Each point is independent of every other point, represented as a separate row in the database model. Points can represent two generic types of features in a GIS. The first is a point feature which represents the actual geographic location of a feature, the second is a label point which resides within a polygon to provide attribute information. A label point does not represent the location of a geographic feature, it represents the polygon within which it resides.

LINE DATA
The line is made up of an ordered set of coordinates linked in a chain to represent the shape and length of a feature such as a road. The decision to represent a feature as a line is scale dependent if the linear feature occupies space at a 1:1 scale.

Other terms for line are ARC and VECTOR The coordinates used to define the length and shape of a line are redefined points linked together. The terms that describe the points used to define a line are NODE and VERTICE A NODE is located at each end of the line identifying the start and end. VERTICES define the shape of the line and occupy the location between the two nodes

NODES- three types: TRUE NODES: a true node is located at the intersection of three or more arcs and forms the junction between the arcs. PSEUDO NODES: are located between two arcs linked together. In this use, the node resides at the normal location of a vertice and acts to separate the characteristics of two sections of the same line . DANGLING NODES: are located at the end of one arc defining it's end and not linked to another arc.

Terminology
Point: x, y coordinate identifying a geographic location Link (line, arc): an ordered set of points with a node at the beginning and end of it Node: the beginning and end of link (often defined where 3 or more lines connect) Polygon: two or more links connected at the nodes, contains a point inside to identify the polygons attributes

Nevada

Utah

California
Arizona

Identify the polygons

Create the polygon attribute table (PAT)

Poly-ID 1 2 3 4 Name California Nevada Utah Arizona Population 33090214 1818259 2135252 4790311

Identify the nodes

Node table
Node ID 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 X-coord Y-coord

Identify the links (arcs, lines)

Simplify this

Create the topology! Links table

Link# 1 2 3 4 5 FNode TNode LPoly RPoly

6
7 8 9 10 11

Nodes First
Link# 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 FNode 1 2 2 6 3 4 5 4 7 3 8 TNode 2 3 6 5 4 LPoly RPoly

Nodes First
Link# 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 FNode 1 2 2 6 3 4 5 4 7 3 8 TNode 2 3 6 5 4 5 7 7 8 8 1 LPoly RPoly

Polygons
Link# 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 FNode 1 2 2 6 3 4 5 4 7 3 8 TNode 2 3 6 5 4 5 7 7 8 8 1 LPoly 1 1 4 4 RPoly 0 4 0 0

Polygons
Link# 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 FNode 1 2 2 6 3 4 5 4 7 3 8 TNode 2 3 6 5 4 5 7 7 8 8 1 LPoly 1 1 4 4 2 3 3 2 2 1 1 RPoly 0 4 0 0 4 4 0 3 0 2 0

Identify the points

Link List
Link# List of points

1
2 3 4

1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10 etc

5
6 7 8

9
10 11

Point Coordinates
ID
1 2 3 4 5 6 7

X-coord

Y-coord

8
9 (etc)

Putting it all together

Poly-ID 1 2 Name California Nevada Population 33090214 Link# 1818259 FNode 2135252 1 1 4790311 2 2 6 TNode 2 3 6 5

PointID 1 2 3 LPoly

X-coord

Y-coord

3
4 Link# 1

Utah
Arizona List of points

RPoly 0 4 0 0

2
3 4

2 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10 3 etc 4

5 1 6 4 7 4

5
6 7 8 9

3
4 5 4 7

4
5 7 7 8

2 8

5
6 7

Node ID X-coord 3 4 91(etc)

4
0 3 0

Y-coord

32 24

23

8
9 10 11

10 11

3 8

8 1

15 17
8 6

2 0

Poly-ID 1 2

Putting it all together

Name Population 33090214 Link# 1818259 FNode 2135252 1 1 4790311 2 2 2 6 TNode 2 3 6 5
1 2

PointID

X-coord

Y-coord

California Nevada

3
4 Link# 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Utah
Arizona List of points

3 LPoly

RPoly 0 4 0 0

5 1 6 4 7 4

3 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10 etc 4

5
6 7 8 9

3
4 5 4 7

4
5 7 7 8

2 8

Node ID X-coord 3 4 91(etc)

4
0 3 0

Y-coord

32 24

23

10 11

3 8

8 1

15 17
8 6

2 0

Poly-ID 1 2

Putting it all together

Name Population 33090214 Link# 1818259 FNode 2135252 1 1 4790311 2 3 4 2 2 6 TNode 2 3 6 5 California Nevada

PointID 1 2

X-coord

Y-coord

3
4

Utah
Arizona

3 LPoly

RPoly 0 4 0 0

5 1 6 4 7 4

Link# 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

List of points

5
7 8 9

3
4 5 4 7

4
5 7 7 8

2 8

1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10 6 etc

Node ID X-coord 3 4 91(etc)

4
0 3 0

Y-coord

32 24

23

10 11

3 8

8 1

15 17
8 6

2 0

Poly-ID 1 2

Putting it all together

Name Population 33090214 Link# 1818259 FNode 2135252 1 1 4790311 2 3 4 2 2 6 TNode 2 3 6 5 California Nevada

PointID 1 2

X-coord

Y-coord

3
4

Utah
Arizona

3 LPoly

RPoly 0 4 0 0

5 1 6 4 7 4

Link# 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

List of points

5
7 8 9

3
4 5 4 7

4
5 7 7 8

2 8

1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10 6 etc

Node ID X-coord 3 4 91(etc)

4
0 3 0

Y-coord

32 24

23

10 11

3 8

8 1

15 17
8 6

2 0

Poly-ID 1 2

Putting it all together

Name Population 33090214 Link# 1818259 FNode 2135252 1 1 4790311 2 3 4 2 2 6 TNode 2 3 6 5
1 2

PointID

X-coord

Y-coord

California Nevada

3
4

Utah
Arizona

3 LPoly

RPoly 0 4 0 0

5 1 6 4 7 4

Link# 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

List of points

5
7 8 9

3
4 5 4 7

4
5 7 7 8

2 8

1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10 6 etc

Node ID X-coord 3 4 91(etc)

4
0 3 0

Y-coord

32 24

23

10 11

3 8

8 1

15 17
8 6

2 0

A look behind the scenes: Vector GIS data models

Spaghetti model Topological vector model Cardinality (this is gonna hurt!) Break

The Spaghetti Model

The spaghetti model is the most simple vector data model The model is a direct representation of a graphical image NO explicit topological information

Spaghetti Model
Description: direct line for line translation of the paper map (often viewed as raw digital data) Pros: easy to implement, good for fast drawing Cons: storage and searches are sequential, storage of attribute data

Spaghetti model

Topology
Branch of mathematics dealing with geometric properties Geometry of objects remain invariant under transformations Neighborhood relationships remain the same Topology is the distinguishing basis for more complicated vector models

Topological Vector Model

Topological data models are provided with information that can help us in obtaining solutions to common operations in advanced GIS analytical techniques. This is done by explicitly recording adjacency information into the data structure, eliminating the need to determine it for multiple operations. Each line segment, the basic logical entity in topological data structures, begins and ends when it either contacts or intersects another line, or when there is a change in direction of the line.

Topological Vector Model

Each line has two sets of numbers, a pair of coordinates and an associated node number. Each line segment has its identification number that is used as a pointer to indicate which set of nodes represent its beginning and ending.

Topological Vector Model

Polygons also have identification codes that relate back to the link numbers. Each link in the polygon now is capable of looking left and right at the polygon numbers to see which two polygons are also stored explicitly, so that even this tedious step is eliminated. The Topological data model more closely approximates how we as map readers identify the spatial relationships contained in an analog map document.

Topological Vector Model

How do we preserve topology in a computer database?

What are we storing?
Points, lines, polygons

What do we need to preserve?

Neighborhood relationships between these objects

Terminology
point, link, node, polygon

The examples above are simple relationships within a GIS. The following examples are more complex and are logically separated into various types of relationships. RELATIONSHIPS WHICH CAN BE COMPUTED FROM THE COORDINATES OF THE OBJECTS Two lines can be examined to see if they cross by identifying the shared node Areas can be examined to see which one encloses a given point Areas can be examined to see if they overlap RELATIONSHIPS WHICH CANNOT BE COMPUTED FROM COORDINATES THESE MUST BE CODED IN THE DATABASE DURING INPUT E.G. We can compute if two lines cross, but not if the highways they represent intersect (may be an overpass) POINT-POINT "IS WITHIN", e.g. Find all of the customer points within 1 km of this retail store point "IS NEAREST TO", e.g. Find the hazardous waste site which is nearest to this ground water well POINT-LINE "ENDS AT", e.g. Find the intersection at the end of this street "IS NEAREST TO", e.g. Find the road nearest to this aircraft crash site
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POINT-AREA "IS CONTAINED IN", e.g. Find all of the customers located in this zip code boundary "CAN BE SEEN FROM", e.g. Determine if any of this lake can be seen from this viewpoint LINE-LINE

"CROSSES", e.g. Determine if this road crosses this river "COMES WITHIN", e.g. Find all of the roads which come within 1 km of this railroad "FLOWS INTO", e.g. Find out if this stream flows into this river
LINE-AREA "CROSSES", e.g. Find all of the soil types crossed by this railroad "BORDERS", e.g. Find out if this road forms part of the boundary of this airfield AREA-AREA "OVERLAPS", e.g. Identify all overlaps between types of soil on this map and types of land use on this other map "IS NEAREST TO", e.g. Find the nearest lake to this forest fire "IS ADJACENT TO", e.g. Find out if these two areas share a common boundary
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Spatial relationships
adjacent to connected to near to intersects with within overlaps etc.

Spatial relationships
logical connections between spatial objects represented by points, lines and polygons e.g., - point-in-polygon - line-line - polygon-polygon

Spatial relationships
some relationships are stored in a topological data model - adjacent to right poly and left poly in the line attribute table - connected to list of lines that share the same node in the node attribute table others need to be computed

is nearest to
point/point - which family planning clinic is closest to the village? point/line - which road is nearest to the village same with other combinations of spatial features

is nearest to: Thiessen polygons

is near to: buffer operations

point buffer - affected area around a polluting facility - catchment area of a water source

buffer operations
line buffer - how many people live near the polluted river? - what is the area impacted by highway noise?

buffer operations
polygon buffer - area around a reservoir where development should not be permitted

crosses: line intersection

when traveling to the dispensary, do farmers have to cross this river?

is within: point in polygon

which of the cholera cases are within the contaminated water catchment area?

Point in polygon

even number of intersections: point is outside odd number of intersections: point is inside

TOPOLOGY (for vector data)

What is topology? Why is important? Three types of topological models in GIS Spatial operations of topology
Contiguity Connectivity

Trade-offs of topological structure

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Spatial features and spatial relationships

Spatial features in maps
Points, lines and polygons

Human being interprets additional information from maps about the spatial relationships between features
A route trace from an airport to a house Land contiguity adjacent to streets along which the lands are located
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The definition of Topology

The spatial relationships can be interpreted
identification of connecting lines along a path definition of the areas enclosed within these lines identification of contiguous areas

In digital maps, these relationships are depicted using Topology Topology = A mathematical procedure for explicitly defining spatial relationship Topology is the description of how the spatial objects are related with spatial meaning
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Topological data models

Three types of topological concepts
Arc, Node and polygon topologies

Arc
Arcs have directions and left and right polygons (=contiguity)

Node
Nodes link arcs with start and end nodes (=connectivity)

Polygon
Arcs that connect to surround an area define a polygon (=area definition)

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Terms and concepts

Connectivity - from and to nodes Contiguity - Polygon Enclosure Adjacency - from Direction
To Node

Left Polygon

Arc

Right Polygon

From Node
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Spatial operations of topology

Connectivity and contiguity (Aronoff, 1989)
A basic, but core spatial analysis operations in GIS

Contiguity
A biologist might be interested in the habitats that occur next to each other A city planner might be interested in zoning conflicts such as industrial zones bordering recreation areas

Connectivity
Transportation network, telecommunication systems, river systems To find optimum routings or most efficient delivery routes or the fastest travel route To predict loading at critical points in a river channel To estimate water flow at a bridge crossing that will result from heavy flood
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Trade-offs of topology
Advantages
Spatial data is stored more efficiently Analysis process faster and efficient for large data sets By topological relationships, we can perform spatial analysis functions, Modelling flow through the connection of lines in a network (i.e. buffering) Combining adjacent polygons with similar characteristics (i.e. spatial merge) Overlaying geographical features (i.e. spatial overlay)

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Disadvantages
Extra cost and time
creating topological structure does impose a cost Topology should be always updated when a new map or existing map is updated

Additional batch job working

To avoid the extra efforts, GIS systems need to run a batch job (i.e. a process that can be run without user interactions); 70% of total GIS costs Autoexec.bat in DOS Macro languages such as AML (Arc/Info), Avenue (ArcView), MapBasic (MapInfo) and etc
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Conclusions of topology
When topology is created, we can identify

Know its positions of spatial features Know what is around it Understand its geographical characteristics by
virtue of recognising its surroundings

Know how to get from A to B

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VECTOR GIS CAPABILITIES A. INTRODUCTION analysis functions with vector GIS are not quite the same as with raster GIS more operations deal with objects
measures such as area have to be calculated from coordinates of objects, instead of counting cells

some operations are more accurate estimates of area based on polygons more accurate than counts of pixels
estimates of perimeter of polygon more accurate than counting pixel boundaries on the edge of a zone

some operations are slower e.g. overlaying layers, finding buffers some operations are faster e.g. finding path through road network B. SIMPLE DISPLAY AND QUERY Display using points and "arcs" can display the locations of all objects stored attributes and entity types can be displayed by varying colors, line patterns and point symbols may only want to display a subset of the data e.g. want to display areas of urban landuse with some base map data select all political boundaries and highways, but only areas that had urban land uses how would the user do this? e.g. one of the layers in a database is a "map" of land use, called USE area objects on this layer have several attributes one attribute, called CLASS, identifies the area's land use for urban land use, it has the value "U" need to extract boundaries for all areas that have CLASS="U"
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SQL extensions for spatial queries some systems allow specifically spatial queries to be handled under SQL e.g. WITHIN operator SELECT &LTobjects> WITHIN &LTspecific area> the criteria for these spatial searches may include searching within the radius of a point, within a bounding rectangle, or within an irregular polygon C. RECLASSIFY, DISSOLVE AND MERGE reclassify, dissolve and merge operations are used frequently in working with area objects these are used to aggregate areas based on attributes consider a soils map: we wish to produce a map of major soil types from a layer that has polygons based on much more finely defined classification scheme Steps 1. reclassify areas by a single attribute or some combination e.g. reclassify soil areas by soil type only 2. dissolve boundaries between areas of same type by delete the arc between two polygons if the relevant attributes are the same in both polygons

63

64

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D. TOPOLOGICAL OVERLAY suppose individual layers have planar enforcement (required in many systems, not all) when two layers are combined ("overlayed", "superimposed") the result must have planar enforcement as well new intersection must be calculated and created wherever two lines cross a line across an area object creates two new area objects topological overlay is the general name for overlay followed by planar enforcement relationships are updated for the new, combined map result may be information about relationships (new attributes) for the old (input) maps rather than the creation of new objects e.g. overlay map of school districts on census tracts result is map showing every school district/census tract combination for each combination, the database contains an area object however, concern may be with obtaining the number of overlapping census tracts as a new attribute of each school district rather than with new objects themselves Point in polygon overlay point objects on areas, compute "is contained in" relationship result is a new attribute for each point e.g. combine wells and planning districts, find district containing each well

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Line on polygon overlay line objects on area objects, compute "is contained in" relationship lines are broken at each area object boundary number of output lines is greater than number of input lines containing area is new attribute of each output line e.g. combine streams and counties, find county containing each stream segment Polygon on polygon ("Polygon overlay") overlay two layers of area objects boundaries are broken at each intersection number of output areas likely greater than the total number of input areas e.g. input watershed boundaries, county boundaries, output map of watershed/county combinations after overlay we can recreate either of the input layers by dissolving and merging based on the attributes contributed by the input layer Example wish to use find those areas that are the best land for timber harvesting after overlay, each original layer contributes attributes to the combined layer we get the final map by selecting the desired attributes of the combined layer SELECT FROM OVERLAY WHERE Species = "Jack pine" AND Soil = "C"

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E. BUFFERING a buffer can be constructed around a point, line or area buffering creates a new area, enclosing the buffered object applications in transportation, forestry, resource management protected zone around lakes and streams zone of noise pollution around highways service zone around bus route (e.g. 300 m walking distance) groundwater pollution zone around waste site options available for raster, such as a "friction" layer, do not exist for vector buffering is much more difficult in vector from the point of view of the programmer sometimes, width of the buffer can be determined by an attribute of the object e.g. buffering residential buildings away from a street network: three types of street (1, 2, 3 or major, secondary, tertiary) with the setbacks being 600 feet from a major street, 200 feet from a secondary street, and only 100 feet from a tertiary street problems with buffer operations may occur when buffering very convoluted lines or areas
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Overlay operations in a GIS

Origins in Landscape Planning
Literally overlaying maps on a light table and searching for overlapping areas GIS started out at GSD in the 1960s

Set theory polygons represent sets, overlay represents intersects and unions

Computational Geometry

Simplest form of overlay

Point in polygon procedure
Line intersects 1 edge of polygon
A

Count how many intersections of the ray, originating at point A, pass through edges of the polygon

Odd number of Intersections = inside, Even = outside

Line intersections
y = a1 + b1x and y = a2 + b2x intersect at: xi = - (a1 - a2) / (b1 - b2), yi = a1 + b1xi
And checking for the values of xi to see that It falls within the x values of each of the lines.

xi, yi

General overlay types

Identity
spatial join or point-in-polygon

Clip
similar to set extent when using raster data

Intersection Union Buffer

(for all of the above, operations are on layers, not single polygons)

Spatial Join
Point in polyogon operation which points are in the Polygon?

Polygon ID (id_1) is added to the point layers attribute table.

Clip
Two polygons, A nd B, Overlap. Clip A using B as a cookie cutter. A B

Clip operation creates a new polygon, C, which is the intersect, or overlap, of A and B. Attributes of A do not appear in C.

Intersect
Two polygons, A nd B, Overlap. Find the Intersection of A using B. A B

Intersect operation creates a new polygon, C, which is the intersection, or overlap, of A and B. Attributes of A and B do appear in C.

Union
Two polygons, A nd B, Overlap. Find the intersection of A using B. A B

Intersect operation creates a new polygon, C, which is the intersect, or overlap, of A and B. Attributes of A do appear in C. A and B are Also part of the union and retain Their attributes.

Buffer
Buffers are polygon shapes that surround a feature by a uniform distance. Buffers can be created around points, lines, and polygons. Buffers dont share the attributes of the feature that they surround. Use spatial Joins to add the attributes. Original points (black) are surrounded by a buffer of 25 meters.

Precision vs accuracy in overlay operations

Data precision vs computer precision
Computer can be infinitely precise Data appears precise but can be inaccurate.

Sliver polygons meaningful?

Decide by size, dimensions, number of arcs, but there is no hard and fast rule.

Sliver polygons
Overlay operations often produce sliver polygons, which may or may not be meaningful. The intersection of polygon A with a layer containing polygons C and D produce a layer with polygons D and E. E is a sliver polygon and may be considered noise. A D B

C E

overlaps: Polygon overlay

2 A I II 1 3

B
III layer 1 1 2 A B 1 2 3 layer 2 I II III 1 2 3 4 5 4

overlay A A B B B I II II I III

Output layer contains all attributes from both input layers

Areal interpolation problem

data need to be transferred from one set of zones to another, where the boundaries are not compatible between the zones reporting zone change data for different sets of areas need to be combined

Polygon overlay
Hospital Catchment Areas Districts

Overlay

Areal weighting
if 30 % of district d overlaps with hospital zone z, then zone z will also receive 30% of district ds population areas of overlap derived from a polygon overlay operation assumes that districts have constant densities

Creating subsets
create a subset of a data set using another incompatible set cookie-cutting

C B

input

clip cover

output

Appending data sets

combine data sets that may have been digitized separately

C B

C B

C B

Edge matching
often required after appending data sets

C B

C B

Merging polygons
aggregation by deleting internal boundaries

Merging polygons
attribute data cannot be merged automatically, since different data types need to be treated differently - categorical data: need to use specific rules - count data need to be aggregated

Merging polygons
some systems only preserve the field that indicates which features to merge (e.g., the state name) in others, the user needs to define which method to use to merge data e.g., sum, average, most common value or others

Editing functions
removal of sliver polygons line snapping rubber sheeting matching features using user-defined links (e.g., for removing distortions in GIS data sets)

Network functions
Shortest route Allocation Accessibility Many more functions based on optimization models