Database managing time and space information
A spatiotemporal database is a database that manages both space and time information. Common examples include:
- Tracking of moving objects, which typically can occupy only a single position at a given time.
- A database of wireless communication networks, which may exist only for a short timespan within a geographic region.
- An index of species in a given geographic region, where over time additional species may be introduced or existing species migrate or die out.
- Historical tracking of plate tectonic activity.
Spatiotemporal databases are an extension of spatial databases and temporal databases. A spatiotemporal database embodies spatial, temporal, and spatiotemporal database concepts, and captures spatial and temporal aspects of data and deals with:
- Geometry changing over time and/or
- Location of objects moving over invariant geometry (known variously as moving objects databases[1] or real-time locating systems).
- ^ Ralf Hartmut Güting; Markus Schneider (2005). Moving Objects Databases. Academic Press. ISBN 978-0-12-088799-6.