# Spatial query against indexed bounding boxes **URL:** \ **Category:** Elasticsearch\ **Created:** [January 24, 2012, 9:06am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/spatial-query-against-indexed-bounding-boxes/6477 "2012-01-24T09:06:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![djcoin\_Simon\_Thepot](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/djcoin_simon_thepot/32/3010_2.png) [@djcoin\_Simon\_Thepot](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/djcoin_Simon_Thepot)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2012, 9:06am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/spatial-query-against-indexed-bounding-boxes/6477/1 "2012-01-24T09:06:20Z")
Hi, I noticed only a few days ago that the only "spatial" type available is a geo\_point (which is already good!). Yet, that makes spatial query quite limited. Are there some plan about making a bouding box or a polygon as new types with associated queries (contains/intersects) ? It would be awesome. Thanks a lot, Simon ---
**Author:** ![kimchy](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/kimchy/32/44952_2.png) [@kimchy](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/kimchy)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2012, 2:58pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/spatial-query-against-indexed-bounding-boxes/6477/2 "2012-01-24T14:58:42Z")
The geo\_point type is just there to mark the field as geo. You already have distance, bbox, and poly geo filters, sort by geo distance, and geo distance faceting. On Tue, Jan 24, 2012 at 11:06 AM, djcoin [Simon Thépot] \< [simon.thepot@gmail.com](mailto:simon.thepot@gmail.com)\> wrote: > Hi, > > I noticed only a few days ago that the only "spatial" type available > is a geo\_point (which is already good!). > Yet, that makes spatial query quite limited. > > Are there some plan about making a bouding box or a polygon as new > types with associated queries (contains/intersects) ? > It would be awesome. > > Thanks a lot, > > Simon ---
**Author:** ![djcoin\_Simon\_Thepot](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/djcoin_simon_thepot/32/3010_2.png) [@djcoin\_Simon\_Thepot](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/djcoin_Simon_Thepot)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2012, 8:07pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/spatial-query-against-indexed-bounding-boxes/6477/3 "2012-01-24T20:07:16Z")
Thanks for your quick reply, I saw I can use all those filters. But I did not see any examples where a spatial query get applied to a geometry that is **not a point on the server side**. Eg: Is there a way to index Polygone/Line in ES and make a bbox request on it, looking for an intersection between the bounding box used in the filter and the 'non-point' geometry stored on the server side ? Thanks again, Simon On 24 jan, 15:58, Shay Banon [kim...@gmail.com](mailto:kim...@gmail.com) wrote: > The geo\_point type is just there to mark the field as geo. You already > have distance, bbox, and poly geo filters, sort by geo distance, and geo > distance faceting. > > On Tue, Jan 24, 2012 at 11:06 AM, djcoin [Simon Thépot] \< > > [simon.the...@gmail.com](mailto:simon.the...@gmail.com)\> wrote: > > > Hi, > > > I noticed only a few days ago that the only "spatial" type available > > is a geo\_point (which is already good!). > > Yet, that makes spatial query quite limited. > > > Are there some plan about making a bouding box or a polygon as new > > types with associated queries (contains/intersects) ? > > It would be awesome. > > > Thanks a lot, > > > Simon ---
**Author:** ![kimchy](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/kimchy/32/44952_2.png) [@kimchy](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/kimchy)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2012, 4:26pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/spatial-query-against-indexed-bounding-boxes/6477/4 "2012-01-25T16:26:47Z")
No, there isn't support for indexing more complex data structures aside from geo points, though, if you can structure it in a way that is represented by several geo points, and then use geo point level search (combined with and/or) it might be good enough. On Tuesday, January 24, 2012 at 10:07 PM, djcoin [Simon Thépot] wrote: > Thanks for your quick reply, > > I saw I can use all those filters. > But I did not see any examples where a spatial query get applied to a > geometry that is **not a point on the server side**. > > Eg: Is there a way to index Polygone/Line in ES and make a bbox > request on it, looking for an intersection between the bounding box > used in the filter and the 'non-point' geometry stored on the server > side ? > > Thanks again, > Simon > > On 24 jan, 15:58, Shay Banon \<[kim...@gmail.com](mailto:kim...@gmail.com) ([http://gmail.com](http://gmail.com))\> wrote: > > > The geo\_point type is just there to mark the field as geo. You already > > have distance, bbox, and poly geo filters, sort by geo distance, and geo > > distance faceting. > > > > On Tue, Jan 24, 2012 at 11:06 AM, djcoin [Simon Thépot] \< > > > > [simon.the...@gmail.com](mailto:simon.the...@gmail.com) ([http://gmail.com](http://gmail.com))\> wrote: > > > > > Hi, > > > > > I noticed only a few days ago that the only "spatial" type available > > > is a geo\_point (which is already good!). > > > Yet, that makes spatial query quite limited. > > > > > Are there some plan about making a bouding box or a polygon as new > > > types with associated queries (contains/intersects) ? > > > It would be awesome. > > > > > Thanks a lot, > > > > > Simon ---
**Author:** ![Jason\_2](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/74df32/32.png) [@Jason\_2](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/Jason_2)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2012, 12:19pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/spatial-query-against-indexed-bounding-boxes/6477/5 "2012-01-26T12:19:23Z")
I work on a NASA project that's using Elasticsearch and just went operational earlier this month. The earth science data we index is usually polygons and bounding boxes. We combined Elasticsearch with Oracle Spatial as a full solution. When we index an object with a spatial area we find the minimum bounding rectangle (MBR) of the spatial area. The MBR consists of north, south, east and west coordinates. The MBR gets put in Elasticsearch and we put the real spatial area in Oracle Spatial. During a search from our application we first convert the user's search area to an MBR. We send the MBR with other search terms to elastic. Elastic search returns very quickly and all of the results are very likely spatial matches because the minimum bounding rectangles intersect. We then do real spatial area intersections in Oracle to get exact matches. We usually end up with about 80-100% of the results from elastic actually intersecting the user's search area. We still need Oracle Spatial to do the real spatial intersections but our searches got about twice as fast overall when we switched from Oracle to Elasticsearch. On Jan 25, 11:26 am, Shay Banon [kim...@gmail.com](mailto:kim...@gmail.com) wrote: > No, there isn't support for indexing more complex data structures aside from geo points, though, if you can structure it in a way that is represented by several geo points, and then use geo point level search (combined with and/or) it might be good enough. > > On Tuesday, January 24, 2012 at 10:07 PM, djcoin [Simon Thépot] wrote: > > > Thanks for your quick reply, > > > I saw I can use all those filters. > > But I did not see any examples where a spatial query get applied to a > > geometry that is **not a point on the server side**. > > > Eg: Is there a way to index Polygone/Line in ES and make a bbox > > request on it, looking for an intersection between the bounding box > > used in the filter and the 'non-point' geometry stored on the server > > side ? > > > Thanks again, > > Simon > > > On 24 jan, 15:58, Shay Banon \<[kim...@gmail.com](mailto:kim...@gmail.com) ([http://gmail.com](http://gmail.com))\> wrote: > > > > > The geo\_point type is just there to mark the field as geo. You already > > > have distance, bbox, and poly geo filters, sort by geo distance, and geo > > > distance faceting. > > > > On Tue, Jan 24, 2012 at 11:06 AM, djcoin [Simon Thépot] \< > > > > [simon.the...@gmail.com](mailto:simon.the...@gmail.com) ([http://gmail.com](http://gmail.com))\> wrote: > > > > > > > Hi, > > > > > I noticed only a few days ago that the only "spatial" type available > > > > is a geo\_point (which is already good!). > > > > Yet, that makes spatial query quite limited. > > > > > Are there some plan about making a bouding box or a polygon as new > > > > types with associated queries (contains/intersects) ? > > > > It would be awesome. > > > > > Thanks a lot, > > > > > Simon ---
**Author:** ![djcoin\_Simon\_Thepot](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/djcoin_simon_thepot/32/3010_2.png) [@djcoin\_Simon\_Thepot](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/djcoin_Simon_Thepot)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2012, 8:56am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/spatial-query-against-indexed-bounding-boxes/6477/6 "2012-01-27T08:56:18Z")
Hey, thanks for the answers/highlights! At the moment, my only need is filtering on intersection between a bbox (input of the user) and edges. As I export the data from PosgreSQL/PostGIS to ES, I planned me too to have an hybrid solution, with spatial specific query being fed to the spatial database. Another solution I was thinking about for my case was to cut the edges in smaller edges (given some criteria, eg: every X kms), thus yielding 'geo\_point' that I would be able to query against with a sastisfying precision in ES. Jason, I'm curious, how do you fed to Oracle the result of your first filter ? You may obtain thousand of result matching the ES query, do you actually make some 'SELECT .. FROM .. Where id in [\<.. your thousand/millions results\>]'. I did not try it myself, but I guess that may exceed the maximum length of and SQL query. And second question ! 🙂 How do calculate intersection between two MBR in ES (user input and stored data) ? Thanks a lot ! Simon On 26 jan, 13:19, Jason [ja...@element84.com](mailto:ja...@element84.com) wrote: > I work on a NASA project that's using Elasticsearch and just went > operational earlier this month. The earth science data we index is > usually polygons and bounding boxes. We combined Elasticsearch with > OracleSpatialas a full solution. When we index an object with aspatialarea we find the minimum bounding rectangle (MBR) of thespatialarea. The MBR consists of north, south, east and west > coordinates. The MBR gets put in Elasticsearch and we put the realspatialarea in OracleSpatial. During a search from our > application we first convert the user's search area to an MBR. We > send the MBR with other search terms to elastic. Elastic search > returns very quickly and all of the results are very likelyspatial > matches because the minimum bounding rectangles intersect. We then do > realspatialarea intersections in Oracle to get exact matches. We > usually end up with about 80-100% of the results from elastic actually > intersecting the user's search area. We still need OracleSpatialto > do the realspatialintersections but our searches got about twice as > fast overall when we switched from Oracle to Elasticsearch. > > On Jan 25, 11:26 am, Shay Banon [kim...@gmail.com](mailto:kim...@gmail.com) wrote: > > > No, there isn't support for indexing more complex data structures aside from geo points, though, if you can structure it in a way that is represented by several geo points, and then use geo point level search (combined with and/or) it might be good enough. > > > On Tuesday, January 24, 2012 at 10:07 PM, djcoin [Simon Thépot] wrote: > > > > > Thanks for your quick reply, > > > > I saw I can use all those filters. > > > But I did not see any examples where aspatialquery get applied to a > > > geometry that is **not a point on the server side**. > > > > Eg: Is there a way to index Polygone/Line in ES and make a bbox > > > request on it, looking for an intersection between the bounding box > > > used in the filter and the 'non-point' geometry stored on the server > > > side ? > > > > Thanks again, > > > Simon > > > > On 24 jan, 15:58, Shay Banon \<[kim...@gmail.com](mailto:kim...@gmail.com) ([http://gmail.com](http://gmail.com))\> wrote: > > > > > > > The geo\_point type is just there to mark the field as geo. You already > > > > have distance, bbox, and poly geo filters, sort by geo distance, and geo > > > > distance faceting. > > > > > On Tue, Jan 24, 2012 at 11:06 AM, djcoin [Simon Thépot] \< > > > > > [simon.the...@gmail.com](mailto:simon.the...@gmail.com) ([http://gmail.com](http://gmail.com))\> wrote: > > > > > > > > > Hi, > > > > > > I noticed only a few days ago that the only "spatial" type available > > > > > is a geo\_point (which is already good!). > > > > > Yet, that makesspatialquery quite limited. > > > > > > Are there some plan about making a bouding box or a polygon as new > > > > > types with associated queries (contains/intersects) ? > > > > > It would be awesome. > > > > > > Thanks a lot, > > > > > > Simon ---
**Author:** ![Jason\_2](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/74df32/32.png) [@Jason\_2](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/Jason_2)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2012, 1:07pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/spatial-query-against-indexed-bounding-boxes/6477/7 "2012-01-30T13:07:52Z")
We can only return a maximum of 2000 results to the user on our API. We retrieve something like ~2,500 matching results from elastic and then query oracle for exact spatial matches using sql like "select \* from spatial\_table where and (id in (\<1000 ids\>) or id in (\<1000 ids\>) or id in ())" We'll usually only need to execute this single statement given that we've already done MBR filtering in elastic. As long as we've found 2000 ids or more from Oracle we'll have found enough to return to the user. We get an extra 500 or so from elastic to help ensure we'll only need to query oracle one time. I don't think I can put the exact algorithm we use to intersect bounding rectangles in elastic but bounding rectangle intersections is pretty simple compared to regular spatial intersections. You should think of the a bounding rectangle as two ranges. One is south to north, the latitude range, and the other is west to east, the longitude range. The two minimum bounding rectangles intersect if both latitude ranges intersect and both longitude ranges intersect. A range intersection is a little trickier with elastic given that elastic doesn't have \< and \> operators like a traditional database. It has a range query ([Elasticsearch Platform — Find real-time answers at scale | Elastic](http://www.elasticsearch.org/guide/reference/) query-dsl/range-query.html) which made it harder for me to get. It helps to draw examples when you come up with the exact algorithm. On Jan 27, 3:56 am, djcoin [Simon Thépot] [simon.the...@gmail.com](mailto:simon.the...@gmail.com) wrote: > Hey, thanks for the answers/highlights! > > At the moment, my only need is filtering on intersection between a > bbox (input of the user) and edges. > As I export the data from PosgreSQL/PostGIS to ES, I planned me too to > have an hybrid solution, with spatial specific query being fed to the > spatial database. > Another solution I was thinking about for my case was to cut the edges > in smaller edges (given some criteria, eg: every X kms), thus yielding > 'geo\_point' that I would be able to query against with a sastisfying > precision in ES. > > Jason, I'm curious, how do you fed to Oracle the result of your first > filter ? You may obtain thousand of result matching the ES query, do > you actually make some 'SELECT .. FROM .. Where id in [\<.. your > thousand/millions results\>]'. > I did not try it myself, but I guess that may exceed the maximum > length of and SQL query. > > And second question ! 🙂 How do calculate intersection between two MBR > in ES (user input and stored data) ? > > Thanks a lot ! > Simon > > On 26 jan, 13:19, Jason [ja...@element84.com](mailto:ja...@element84.com) wrote: > > > I work on a NASA project that's using Elasticsearch and just went > > operational earlier this month. The earth science data we index is > > usually polygons and bounding boxes. We combined Elasticsearch with > > OracleSpatialas a full solution. When we index an object with aspatialarea we find the minimum bounding rectangle (MBR) of thespatialarea. The MBR consists of north, south, east and west > > coordinates. The MBR gets put in Elasticsearch and we put the realspatialarea in OracleSpatial. During a search from our > > application we first convert the user's search area to an MBR. We > > send the MBR with other search terms to elastic. Elastic search > > returns very quickly and all of the results are very likelyspatial > > matches because the minimum bounding rectangles intersect. We then do > > realspatialarea intersections in Oracle to get exact matches. We > > usually end up with about 80-100% of the results from elastic actually > > intersecting the user's search area. We still need OracleSpatialto > > do the realspatialintersections but our searches got about twice as > > fast overall when we switched from Oracle to Elasticsearch. > > > On Jan 25, 11:26 am, Shay Banon [kim...@gmail.com](mailto:kim...@gmail.com) wrote: > > > > No, there isn't support for indexing more complex data structures aside from geo points, though, if you can structure it in a way that is represented by several geo points, and then use geo point level search (combined with and/or) it might be good enough. > > > > On Tuesday, January 24, 2012 at 10:07 PM, djcoin [Simon Thépot] wrote: > > > > > > > Thanks for your quick reply, > > > > > I saw I can use all those filters. > > > > But I did not see any examples where aspatialquery get applied to a > > > > geometry that is **not a point on the server side**. > > > > > Eg: Is there a way to index Polygone/Line in ES and make a bbox > > > > request on it, looking for an intersection between the bounding box > > > > used in the filter and the 'non-point' geometry stored on the server > > > > side ? > > > > > Thanks again, > > > > Simon > > > > > On 24 jan, 15:58, Shay Banon \<[kim...@gmail.com](mailto:kim...@gmail.com) ([http://gmail.com](http://gmail.com))\> wrote: > > > > > > > > > The geo\_point type is just there to mark the field as geo. You already > > > > > have distance, bbox, and poly geo filters, sort by geo distance, and geo > > > > > distance faceting. > > > > > > On Tue, Jan 24, 2012 at 11:06 AM, djcoin [Simon Thépot] \< > > > > > > [simon.the...@gmail.com](mailto:simon.the...@gmail.com) ([http://gmail.com](http://gmail.com))\> wrote: > > > > > > > > > > > Hi, > > > > > > > I noticed only a few days ago that the only "spatial" type available > > > > > > is a geo\_point (which is already good!). > > > > > > Yet, that makesspatialquery quite limited. > > > > > > > Are there some plan about making a bouding box or a polygon as new > > > > > > types with associated queries (contains/intersects) ? > > > > > > It would be awesome. > > > > > > > Thanks a lot, > > > > > > > Simon ---
**Author:** ![system](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/original/3X/1/a/1ac57faf039f6b580b3f104ef42a2a89e41014de.png) [@system](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/system)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2017, 3:41am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/spatial-query-against-indexed-bounding-boxes/6477/8 "2017-07-06T03:41:04Z")