A wide spectrum of research areas have contributed to the development of objectoriented analysis and design methods. Within computing sciences objectorientation has been developed in the fields of databases, programming languages, and system engineering. Some indications of this development include the proliferation of objectoriented concepts, notations, models, and application areas. This book provides a much-needed geographic perspective to enhance both the development and understanding of object-oriented methodology. In particular, it addresses how both Time Geography and the object-oriented methodologies can be integrated to represent and manipulate space and time in GIS.

Time Geography provides a conceptual framework for capturing the semantics of space and time. This book introduces the reader to the framework abstractions developed in Time Geography. They are of primordial importance for handling spatiotemporal data in GIS. They play an important role as a modelling tool for representing the passage of time and the mechanisms of change. The book explains how the time geographic abstractions can be integrated with the modelling constructs of objectoriented analysis and design methods. This is achieved by describing a spatio-temporal data model designed to address the complex and subtle semantics of space and time of historical data. The logical components (schema evolution, data update procedures, events) and the physical structure (storage structure, access methods, multidimensional indexing) of the spatio-temporal data model are also described in the book.