[OSM-dev] curves

[Frederik Ramm]

Hi,

>> What people think about explicitly supporting curves as a part of  
>> geometry model? This way we can model the world better.
> 
> When I suggested this before, someone said it was patented, possibly by
> either NavTeq or TeleAtlas, 

Navteq seem to have a patent on using Bezier curves for road network 
representation or something. It was on the lists here.

I also find the idea very tempting, however one has to bear in mind that 
some things could then become very difficult. For example, computing the 
combined length of all motorways is trivial today, and will probably 
require specialist tools if we go Bezier. Equally, finding intersections 
and the like (think Validator plugin) - probably a computational 
nightmare if Beziers are involved.

Will the built-in PostGIS stuff ("give me everything that intersects 
with this rectangle") work out-of-the box with Beziers?

Bye
Frederik