An Architecture for the Management of GIS Data Files
Gregory L. Vert, Molly W. Stock, Piotr L. Jankowski, Paul E. Gessler · Transactions in GIS · 2002
Management of GIS data presents unique problems. These include the need to manage a wide range of differing applications ’ data formats, group files into meaningful organizations that are driven by geospatial concerns, provide lineage and version support, provide documentation of the nature of the data and other descriptive information, and keep track of relationships among data files and groups of data files. Current approaches to data management can provide partial solutions to these problems, but none is complete. We have developed a software architecture that addresses all levels of this problem. This architecture centers around a data model that is populated with metadata and extended with fuzzy set theory notation. Fuzzy set theory allowed us to solve data ambiguity problems and to develop an object‐oriented framework that served as the basis for a proof‐of‐concept prototype. In addition, we developed file system organizations, computer network communications strategies and the mechanics of basic system operation so that the architecture provides a blueprint for a new type of software.