Animated Points: Storing and Retrieving Time-Dependent Information

Kurzfassung

In geosciences map animations help to explore, analyze and validate complex settings and to display – and ultimately understand – higher dimensions of information by combining attribute information from multiple sources. Despite the omnipresence of geographic information system technology (GIST), standard information systems (IS) are not designed to store temporal information on the same implementation level as spatial information is stored. However, it is possible to model temporal information as another object attribute despite several limitations. The objective of this paper is to develop a structural model for storing and accessing spatial data primitives that are connected to their naturally temporal information for the purpose of creating map animations. We here summarize the nature of (carto-) graphic variables and discuss their potential use for map animation in general and for animated point symbols in particular. Scenarios of simple and complex feature animations complement this discussion. Our results lead to a simple data model in which temporal information can be stored on an attribute level, accessed using standard relational queries and animated as map features.