A Syntactic Approach for Handling the Semantics of Fuzzy Spatial Objects
Martien Molenaar · 2020
This chapter introduces a syntax for handling information about terrain objects, with their object classes and their attributes, the geometric data and the different types of relationships among these objects. This syntax should be able to handle different semantics defined within different user contexts; furthermore, it should be possible to implement this syntax in information systems through the definition of the data types and link types among these data types. The chapter formulates a syntax that can handle the semantics of state descriptions of fuzzy spatial objects. A syntax for geographic information systems should have a formalistic (discrete) mathematical structure that can be handled by finite state machines. The geometric description consists of the topology of the objects, their shape and their position. The topology can be expressed through the relationships between the objects, the faces and the edges.