Qualitative spatial relationships cleaning for spatial data mining

In this article, we investigate the problem of preparing qualitative spatial relations before implementing spatial data mining by checking consistency in a constraint network, which includes topological and cardinal directional relations between pairs of spatial objects. We aim to explore potential spatial relations and possible inconsistency among the data of relationships for enforcing the correctness of spatial data mining. This task is carried out through qualitative spatial reasoning method, specifically consistency checking. We try to lay the theoretical foundation for this kind of problem. Instead of using conventional composition tables, we investigate the interactions between topological and cardinal directional relations with the aid of rules. These rules are shown to be sound, i.e. the deductions are logically correct. Based on these rules, an improved constraint propagation algorithm is introduced to enforce the path consistency. An example is presented to show the utility of these rules.