Spatial databases, addressing the growing data management and analysis needs of spatial applications such as Geographic Information Systems, have been an active area of research for more than two decades. This research has produced a taxonomy of models for space, spatial data types and operators, spatial query languages and processing strategies, as well as spatial indexes and clustering techniques. However, more research is needed to improve support for network and field data, as well as query processing (e.g., cost models, bulk load). Another important need is to apply spatial data management accomplishments to newer applications, such as data warehouses and multimedia information systems. The objective of this paper is to identify recent accomplishments and associated research needs of the near term.
Spatial indexing has been one of the active focus areas in recent database research. Several variants of Quadtree and R-tree indexes have been proposed in database literature. In this paper, we first describe briefly our implementation of Quadtree and R-tree index structures and related optimizations in Oracle Spatial. We then examine the relative merits of t h e two structures as implemented in Oracle Spatial and compare their performance for different types of queries and other operations. Finally, we summarize our experiences with these different structures in indexing large GIS datasets in Oracle Spatial.
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