Trajectory

Synonyms

Moving Points

Definition

Representation of a time dependent position observed over some period of time. Usually represented as a polyline in a 3D (2D + time) space for an object moving in the 2D plane.

Main Text

Trajectories describe complete histories of movement; they are stored in moving objects databases, sometimes called trajectory databases in the literature. When operations are included, a trajectory corresponds to a value of a moving point data type. Queries of databases containing trajectories can be formulated using moving object languages. When uncertainty about an object’s precise position is taken into account, an uncertain trajectory (Trajcevski et al. 2004) results which can be viewed as a kind of cylindrical volume in the 2D + time space. There exists much work on indexing trajectories (Mokbel et al. 2003). Querying for trajectories similar to a given one is also an important research area (Chen et al. 2005).

Cross-References

• Moving Object Languages...