SpatialRules

SpatialRules Brochure: Spatial and Temporal Rule Engine 

SpatialRules is a spatiotemporal rule system--a unique service-oriented middleware component that allows you to create real-time rules for monitoring and processing spatial and temporal conditions 24 hours a day. With SpatialRules, you can integrate spatial and temporal reasoning into your operations and decision making and take advantage of dynamic data from location-aware devices and sensors. SpatialRules can monitor a wide variety of spatial and temporal conditions among objects in space such as inside/outside, enter/exit and distance, and combine those spatial conditions with other business or mission metadata. Significant events detected by the SpatialRules engine can be passed along to human analysts and decision-makers as alerts, or sent to other systems for visualization, automated response and other downstream processing.

The Need for a Spatiotemporal Rule System

Recent advances in sensor technology and mobile communications have made available large amounts of fine-grained location data. Data from Global Positioning System (GPS) devices, Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) readers, automated target recognition, networked sensors, and other location-aware systems can now be collected and communicated in greater volumes than ever before.

The availability of so much data presents an overwhelming challenge: the amount of data available far exceeds the human capacity to absorb and analyze it. Traditional Geographic Information Systems (GIS) are able to visualize data captured by these devices, but specialized spatial and temporal analysis tools are needed to extract real meaning from noise, and to augment human analysis and judgment by highlighting relevant information. 

Applications

SpatialRules, combined with infrastructure for collecting real time data from location-determining systems, creates a wide range of possibilities in commercial, military and intelligence gathering applications and missions:

Commercial

  • Transportation/Logistics
  • Supply Chain Management
  • Field Force Management
  • Business Intelligence and Analysis

Military

  • Common Operational Picture
  • Situational Awareness
  • Force Protection
  • Blue/Red Force Tracking
  • Logistics

Intelligence, Law Enforcementand Homeland Security

  • Geospatial Intelligence Gathering, Analysis and Dissemination
  • Critical Infrastructure Protection
  • Surveillance and Threat Detection
  • Port and Border Security

Architecture and Integration

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SpatialRules System Diagram
SpatialRules is an open, service-oriented middleware component that can be used with virtually any system. Integrating SpatialRules with an application requires development of a few straightforward data and programmatic interfaces to deliver “location reports” to the SpatialRules engine and to receive events issued by the engine. Location reports and events are transmitted to the engine in XML format. Output can be directed to queuing systems and relational databases, as well as XML streams such as RSS, GeoRSS, KML and GML. Business and operational data can be sent to SpatialRules as part of location reports in rules processing, or merged with location data when an event is reported. 
 

Our Products

  • SpatialFX® - Integrate dynamic location data into your Java, J2EE and Web 2.0 applications.
  • SpatialRules™ - Intelligently manage the flood of spatial information using spatial and temporal conditions.
  • FleetScape™ -  Visually monitor your transportation business from a web browser or operations center display.

Solutions Guide