A Conceptual modelling for GIS developing

The goal of the present work is to provide a conceptual modelling of the physical domain related to a general environmental GIS application. The proposed model has a general validity and is not constrained to any particular implementation. This model may be a first step for fixing a general conceptual definition of GIS. It may be useful even in connection with the semantic aspects related to the heterogeneity of the geo-information. Furthermore this model can provide a global scheme of the territorial information according to which heterogeneous GISs can be compared and integrated. This work consists of three main parts. The first part focuses on conceptual modelling and knowledge representation. In particular this part reports the different types of knowledge that a GIS must deal with. The second part is concerned with formalism used according to the geo-information conceptual model features. These concepts and features are the structural and constraint rules of a scientific conceptual-modelling language for the development of information systems. This language has been used for the formalization of a proposed conceptual modelling on an environmental information system. This language allows us to represent reality easily by means of entities and activities. Furthermore this knowledge representation treats attributes and objects at the same level, extending the use of the semantic abstraction. The third and conclusive part presents the formalization of the general environmental application. The subject world of the system considers many heterogeneous data. Some examples extracted from the system are reported. In particular the possible semantic abstractions are presented.