Chapter 4 :Spatial Query Languages

4.1 Standard Database Query Languages

4.2 Basic SQL Primer
4.3 Extending SQL for Spatial Data
4.4 Example Queries that emphasize spatial aspects
4.5 Trends: Object-Relational SQL
Introduction

The need for spatial query language

Geographic Information System (GIS), Image Database, Remote
Sensing
Existing query languages are insufficient
Only address the particular properties of lexical data
• Treat spatial data as integers and strings
Spatial Data have additional properties
• Geometry
• Graphical presentation
What is a query?
What is a Query ?
A query is a “question” posed to a database
Queries are expressed in a high-level declarative manner
• Algorithms needed to answer the query are not specified in the query
Examples:
Mouse click on a map symbol (e.g. road) may mean
• What is the name of road pointed to by mouse cursor ?
Typing a keyword in a search engine (e.g. google, yahoo) means
• Which documents on web contain given keywords?
SELECT S.name FROM Senator S WHERE S.gender = ‘F’ means
• Which senators are female?
 Example
SELECT ImageName
FROM S_Images
WHERE RECTANGLE(-77.748125, 38.695 , -77.348125 , 39.095) OVERLAPS area

Query Result :
image4/W775647N389000.jpg
image4/W775644N388927.jpg
image4/W775644N388855.jpg
image4/W775641N388783.jpg
image4/W775555N389000.jpg
image4/W775552N388927.jpg
image4/W775550N388855.jpg
image4/W775547N388783.jpg
image4/W775463N389002.jpg
image4/W775461N388930.jpg
image4/W775458N388858.jpg
image4/W775455N388786.jpg
What is a query language?
What is a query language?
A language to express interesting questions about data
A query language restricts the set of possible queries
Examples:
Natural language, e.g. English, can express almost all queries
Computer programming languages, e.g. Java,
• can express computable queries
• however algorithms to answer the query is needed
Structured Query Language(SQL)
• Can express common data intensive queries
• Not suitable for recursive queries
Graphical interfaces, e.g. web-search, mouse clicks on a map
• can express few different kinds of queries
An Example World Database
Purpose: Use an example database to learn query language SQL
Conceptual Model
3 Entities: Country, City, River
2 Relationships: capital-of, originates-in
Attributes listed in Figure 3.1
An Example Database - Logical Model

• 3 Relations
Country(Name, Cont, Pop, GDP, Life-Exp, Shape)
City(Name, Country, Pop,Capital, Shape)
River(Name, Origin, Length, Shape)
• Keys
• Primary keys are Country.Name, City.Name, River.Name
• Foreign keys are River.Origin, City.Country
• Data for 3 tables
• Shown on next slide
World database data tables
What is SQL?
SQL - General Information
is a standard query language for relational databases
It support logical data model concepts, such as relations, keys, ...
Supported by major brands, e.g. IBM DB2, Oracle, MS SQL Server, Sybase, ...
3 versions: SQL1 (1986), SQL2 (1992), SQL 3 (1999)
Can express common data intensive queries
SQL 1 and SQL 2 are not suitable for recursive queries
SQL and spatial data management
ESRI Arc/Info included a custom relational DBMS named Info
Other GIS software can interact with DBMS using SQL
• using open database connectivity (ODBC) or other protocols
In fact, many software use SQL to manage data in back-end DBMS
And a vast majority of SQL queries are generated by other software
Although we will be writing SQL queries manually!
Three Components of SQL?
Data Definition Language (DDL)
Creation and modification of relational schema
Schema objects include relations, indexes, etc.
Data Manipulation Language (DML)
Insert, delete, update rows in tables
Query data in tables
Data Control Language (DCL)
Concurrency control, transactions
Administrative tasks, e.g. set up database users, security permissions
Focus for now
A little bit of table creation (DDL) and population (DML)
Primarily Querying (DML)
Creating Tables in SQL
• Table definition
• “CREATE TABLE” statement
• Specifies table name, attribute names and data types
• Create a table with no rows.
• See an example at the bottom
• Related statements
• ALTER TABLE statement modifies table schema if needed
• DROP TABLE statement removes an empty table
Populating Tables in SQL
• Adding a row to an existing table
• “INSERT INTO” statement
• Specifies table name, attribute names and values
• Example:
INSERT INTO River(Name, Origin, Length) VALUES(‘Mississippi’, ‘USA’, 6000)

• Related statements
• SELECT statement with INTO clause can insert multiple rows in a table
• Bulk load, import commands also add multiple rows
• DELETE statement removes rows
•UPDATE statement can change values within selected rows
Querying populated Tables in SQL
• SELECT statement
• The commonly used statement to query data in one or more tables
• Returns a relation (table) as result
• Has many clauses
• Can refer to many operators and functions
• Allows nested queries which can be hard to understand
• Scope of our discussion
• Learn enough SQL to appreciate spatial extensions
•Observe example queries
• Read and write simple SELECT statement
• Understand frequently used clauses, e.g. SELECT, FROM, WHERE
• Understand a few operators and function
SELECT Statement- General Information
• Clauses
•SELECT specifies desired columns
•FROM specifies relevant tables
•WHERE specifies qualifying conditions for rows
•ORDER BY specifies sorting columns for results
•GROUP BY, HAVING specifies aggregation and statistics
•Operators and functions
•arithmetic operators, e.g. +, -, …
•comparison operators, e.g. =, <, >, BETWEEN, LIKE…
•logical operators, e.g. AND, OR, NOT, EXISTS,
•set operators, e.g. UNION, IN, ALL, ANY, …
•statistical functions, e.g. SUM, COUNT, ...
• many other operators on strings, date, currency, ...
SELECT Example 1.
• Simplest Query has SELECT and FROM clauses
• Query: List all the cities and the country they belong to.

SELECT Name, Country

FROM CITY

Result à
 SELECT Example 2.
• Commonly 3 clauses (SELECT, FROM, WHERE) are used
•Query: List the names of the capital cities in the CITY table.
SELECT *
FROM CITY
WHERE CAPITAL=‘Y ’

Result à
Query Example…Where clause
Query: List the attributes of countries in the Country relation
where the life-expectancy is less than seventy years.

SELECT Co.Name,Co.Life-Exp
FROM Country Co
WHERE Co.Life-Exp <70

Note: use of alias ‘Co’ for Table ‘Country’

Result à
Multi-table Query Examples
Query: List the capital cities and populations of countries
whose GDP exceeds one trillion dollars.
Note:Tables City and Country are joined by matching “City.Country =
Country.Name”. This simulates relational operator “join” discussed in 3.2

SELECT Ci.Name,Co.Pop
FROM City Ci,Country Co
WHERE Ci.Country =Co.Name
AND Co.GDP >1000.0
AND Ci.Capital=‘Y ’
Multi-table Query Example
Query: What is the name and population of the capital city in the
country where the St. Lawrence River originates?

SELECT Ci.Name, Ci.Pop

FROM City Ci, Country Co, River R
WHERE R.Origin =Co.Name
AND Co.Name =Ci.Country
AND R.Name =‘St.Lawrence ’
AND Ci.Capital=‘Y ’

Note: Three tables are joined together pair at a time. River.Origin is matched
with Country.Name and City.Country is matched with Country.Name. The
order of join is decided by query optimizer and does not affect the result.
Query Examples…Aggregate Staistics
Query: What is the average population of the noncapital cities listed in the
City table?

SELECT AVG(Ci.Pop)
FROM City Ci
WHERE Ci.Capital=‘N ’

Query: For each continent, find the average GDP.

SELECT Co.Cont,Avg(Co.GDP)AS Continent-GDP

FROM Country Co
GROUP BY Co.Cont
Query Example..Having clause, Nested queries
Query: For each country in which at least two rivers originate, find the length
of the smallest river.

SELECT R.Origin, MIN(R.length) AS Min-length

FROM River
GROUP BY R.Origin
HAVING COUNT(*) > 1

Query: List the countries whose GDP is greater than that of Canada.

SELECT Co.Name
FROM Country Co
WHERE Co.GDP >ANY(SELECT Co1.GDP
FROM Country Co1
WHERE Co1.Name =‘Canada ’)