For Advanced Database Topics courses taught in Computer Science departments and Advanced Geographic Information Systems courses taught in departments such as Geography, Natural Resources, Civil Engineering, Urban Planning, Transportation, Environmental Studies etc.
This text helps students master various stages of spatial database design and implementation, introducing conceptual models (e.g., pictogram enhanced ERD), explaining query languages (e.g., OGIS, SQL3), and finally describing efficient implementations using query optimization and spatial indexes (e.g., R-trees). Aimed at students as well as professionals interested in spatial database and GIS, this text balances theory and practice to provide many firsts: extensive use of industry standard OGIS spatial data types, comprehensive coverage of emerging topics of spatial networks, and spatial data mining.
Shashi Shekhar, an authority on spatial databases, is a professor and the head of the Spatial Database Research Group in the Department of Computer Science at the University of Minnesota. Shashi has published numerous articles and has advised many organizations on spatial database issues. He holds a Ph.D. degree in Computer Science from the University of California, Berkeley.
Sanjay Chawla is a Senior Technical Instructor with Vignette Corporation in Waltham, Massachusetts. He holds a Ph.D. degree from the University of Tennessee.