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Composing Models of Geographic Physical Processes

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Spatial Information Theory (COSIT 2009)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNTCS,volume 5756))

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Abstract

Processes are central for geographic information science; yet geographic information systems (GIS) lack capabilities to represent process related information. A prerequisite to including processes in GIS software is a general method to describe geographic processes independently of application disciplines. This paper presents such a method, namely a process description language. The vocabulary of the process description language is derived formally from mathematical models. Physical processes in geography can be described in two equivalent languages: partial differential equations or partial difference equations, where the latter can be shown graphically and used as a method for application specialists to enter their process models. The vocabulary of the process description language comprises components for describing the general behavior of prototypical geographic physical processes. These process components can be composed by basic models of geographic physical processes, which is shown by means of an example.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Geoinformation and Cartography, Vienna University of Technology, 1040, Vienna, Austria

    Barbara Hofer & Andrew U. Frank

Authors
  1. Barbara Hofer
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  2. Andrew U. Frank
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Geography, University of Iowa, 316 Jessup Hall, 52242, Iowa City, IA, USA

    Kathleen Stewart Hornsby

  2. Naval Academy Research Institute, 29240, Brest Naval, France

    Christophe Claramunt

  3. Groupe Cognition Humaine, LIMSI-CNRS, Université de Paris-Sud, 91403, Orsay, France

    Michel Denis

  4. LIMSI-CNRS, Université de Paris-Sud, 91403, Orsay, France

    Gérard Ligozat

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Hofer, B., Frank, A.U. (2009). Composing Models of Geographic Physical Processes. In: Hornsby, K.S., Claramunt, C., Denis, M., Ligozat, G. (eds) Spatial Information Theory. COSIT 2009. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 5756. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-03832-7_26

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-03832-7_26

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-642-03831-0

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-642-03832-7

  • eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)

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