
XII Preface
current standards. This Encyclopedia is also simultaneously available as an XML online reference with hyperlinked
citations, cross-references, four-color art, links to Web-based maps, and other interactive features.
Key Features at a Glance
• Immediate point of entry into the field for researchers
• A–Z format allows easy, intuitive access for newcomers to the field
• Many headers for easy skimming and navigation of topics
• Includes coverage of GIS standards in dev elopment by ISO
• Cross-referenced entries
• Internationally renowned editorial board, both scientifically and geographically diverse
• Hundreds of contributors ensure balanced coverage
• Interactive features add to convenience, ease of use and understanding
• Peer-reviewed entries assure researchers that information is vetted
• eReference is available at springerlink.com
Content Organization
The encyclopedia is divided into 41 fields, each one an important sub-area within GIS. These fields include: Basic
Concepts; Basic Storage and Retrieval Structure; Cartography and Visualization; Commercial GIS; Commercial Spatial
Databases; Critical Evaluation of Standard Proposals; Data Exchange and Interoperability; Digital Road Map; Emergen-
cy Evacuations; Evacuation Planning and Operations; Geosensor Networks; GeoSpatial Semantic Web; GIS in Business
Intelligence, Routing; GIS Issues and Applications; Indoor Positioning; Information Collection Using Sensor Network;
Open Source GIS Software; Photogrammetry; Representation of Inexact Spatial Information; Road Network Databases;
Security and Privacy in Geospatial Information Systems; Spatial Analysis; Spatial Aspects of Bioinformatics; Spatial
Aspects of Distributed Computing; Spatial Aspects of Mobile Computing; Spatial Association Discovery; Spatial Co-
location Rule Mining; Spatial Constraint Databases; Spatial Data Warehousing and Decision Support; Spatial Database
Modeling for Applications; Spatial Indexing; Spatial Outlier Detection; Spatial Prediction; Spatial Thinking; Spatial
Time Series; Spatial Uncertainty and Imprecision; Spatio-Temporal Data Modeling; Spatio-Temporal Databases; Sta-
tistical Modeling for Spatial Data; Tesselation Data Models; and Use of Spatial Data for Simulation.
Acknowledgements
Many people hav e played a part in the production of this book and we are extremely grateful to them. In particular,
field editors who have made excellent efforts include Vijay Atluri, Sudipto Banerjee, Yvan Bedard, Sanjay Chawla,
Robert Denaro, Liping Di, Frederico Fonseca, Andrew Frank, Oscar Franzese, Dimitrios Gunopulos, Erik Hoel, Kath-
leen Hornsby, Yan Huang, Robert Kauffman, Baris Kazar, Sangho Kim, Ravi Kothuri, Phaedon Kyriakidis, Xinrong
Li, Henry Liu, Chang-Tien Lu, Nikos Mamoulis, Helmut Mayer, Liqiu Meng, Mohamed Mokbel, Andreas Neumann,
Silvia Nittel, Leon Osborne, Sudhanshu Sekhar Panda, Srinivasan Parthasarathy, Peter Revesz, Ashok Samal, Markus
Schneider, Cyrus Shahabi, Jayant Sharma, Yufei Tao, Vassilis Tsotras, Ouri Wolfson, Chaowei Yang, Pusheng Zhang,
and Naijun Zhou.
We would like to thank the members of the spatial database research group in the Computer Science Department at the
University of Minnesota. They contributed in many different ways including providing literature surveys, organizing
topics, and reviewing articles. We would also like to thank some of the students enrolled in Csci 8701 and Csci 8715 for
contributing articles.
Finally, special thanks are due to many people at Springer for their enthusiasm, advice, and support. In particular , we
would like to thank Susan Lagerstrom-Fife, Oona Schmid, Jennifer Carlson, Andrea Schmidt, Simone Tavenrath, Sharon
Palleschi, and Yana Lambert, who at different times hav e played key roles in the dev elopment of this book.
August, 2007 Shashi Shekhar and Hui Xiong