A perspective of spatial data mining

This paper presents a perspective of spatial data mining. First, the motivation and development of spatial data mining are overviewed. Second, the intension and extension of spatial data mining concept are presented in the knowledge to be discovered, and the relationships between spatial data mining and other subjects. Third, the discovery mechanism is taken as a process of discovering a form of rules plus exceptions at hierarchal view-angles with various thresholds. Fourth, mining granularity is proposed as the measurement of data, information and knowledge. Fifth, the existing theories and techniques are briefed. Finally, the whole paper is concluded.