Geospatial data types

Geospatial Analytics provides a hierarchy of geospatial data types.

The figure below shows this hierarchy. In this figure, the instantiable types have a white background; the uninstantiable types have a shaded background.

Instantiable data types are ST_Point, ST_LineString, ST_Polygon, ST_GeomCollection, ST_MultiPoint, ST_MultiPolygon, and ST_MultiLineString.

Data types that are not instantiable are ST_Geometry, ST_Curve, ST_Surface, ST_MultiSurface, and ST_MultiCurve.

Figure 1. Hierarchy of spatial data types. Data types named in white boxes are instantiable. Data types named in shaded boxes are not instantiable.

The hierarchy includes:

Data types for geographic features that can be perceived as forming a single unit; for example, individual residences and isolated lakes.
Data types for geographic features that are made up of multiple units or components; for example, canal systems and groups of islands in a lake.
A data type for geographic features of all kinds.

Db2® for i provides these data types as user-defined data types in schema QSYS2.