Adding 3d GIS visualization and navigation to the sparqlquery loop

Abstract

3D environments allow advanced spatial navigation and visualization, but have traditionally provided limited support for performing non-spatial data analysis operations like filtering, joining, and integrating data on-the-fly. Linked Open Data provides advanced support for performing filters and joins over datasets that can be dynamically combined through SPARQL federation. Unfortunately, Linked Data results often lack intuitive visualization capabilities, making it relatively difficult to interpret the data for a data analyst. In this paper we present our integration of 3D visualization into the read-evaluate-print-loop of SPARQL query execution. We show how the inclusion of 3D visualization has concrete benefits for the SPARQL query writing process, and how our integrated solution is used to answer specific use cases that could not be answered before.