Help define the requirements for an Oracle Spatial management tool

Question

Hi,
We are developing a tool that, we hope, will be indispensable for all Oracle Spatial and Locator dbas/users. We've released version 1.0, but we need your help to define the requirements for the next version.
What features would you like to have in a management tool for your spatial databases?
The features we've got so far:
1. Viewing of vector data in a map + attributes
2. Loading from shapefiles
3. Exporting to shapefiles
4. Validating metadata, indexes and spatial data.
We are adding editing of vectors in the next version - basic stuff for add, update and delete.
But there must be a lot more. What do you find difficult to do in Oracle Spatial/Locator? What would you like in a tool such as this?
Any feedback either to myself or the forum is much appreciated.
cheers,
Andrew
[email protected]
PS If you like to have a look at what we have done so far, go to http://www.geometryit.com/products/spatialConsole.php

Answer 1

Andrew knows what I have asked for but for others to think about and to start
the ball rolling, here's what they are:
1. Ability to enter own SQL commands but with PARAMETERS for attributes
and shapes as in the following examples:
SELECT ...
FROM my_spatial_table a
WHERE a.ATTRIBUTE = :attr
AND MDSYS.SDO_RELATE(a.shape,:polygon,'mask=anyinteract') = 'TRUE'
When executed the attribute value is asked for via a input box (data type?)
and the user is asked to define the SDO_GEOMETRY for the :polgygon parameter via mouse clicks on the screen.
Similarly, this would work for INSERT, UPDATE and DELETE...
INSERT INTO my_spatial_table (shape) values(:polygon)
The data type of an attribute parameter could be determined in two ways:
a) By querying the Oracle catalog;
b) By using a "PARAMETERS" command before the query as follows
PARAMETERS name type [(size)] [, name type [(size)] ...]
The PARAMETERS declaration has these parts:
name     The name of the parameter.
type     The type of the parameter.
size     The size of the parameter in characters or bytes.
2. When executing an SQL SELECT statement I would like the tool
to suggest the HINTS that are needed to improve performance.
3. Following on from 2, I would like to Tick an option that would return the
EXPLAIN PLAN that the query optimizer used when executing my query.
4. The tool has to support ALL Oracle's spatial vector data types.
5. It would be nice to be able to work with GeoRasters. Since Spatial Console
imports/exports shapefiles why not the same for rasters. However, the problem
with supporting foreign data formats is WHERE DO YOU STOP!!!!!
6. You could allow for the styling of the Spatial Console to be stored in the MapViewer catalogs or use the MapViewer catalogs when styling an Sdo_Geometry if it exists (I note that your tool extracts the SDO_METADATA
why not the MapViewer metadata as well)?
regards
S.