Relations

A Relation compares any two Values and returns a result of true or false.

They can either compare scalar values or spatial geometries.

Scalar Relationships

Scalar Relationships compare two Values (boolean, integers, real numbers, strings, or timestamps).

A Predicate using a Scalar Relationship can only return a Boolean value of True or False based on the result of comparing the two values.

Note: For Greater Than, Less Than and similar Scalar Relationships, True is considered greater than False, times and dates that are later/in the future are greater than those in the present/past, and alphanumeric characters are ordered by their character code.

Example: Numbers are "less than" upper-case letters, which are "less than" lower-case letters, so "e" is greater than "E".

Types of Scalar Relationships

Scalar Relationship	Data Type	Description
Begins With	String	Test whether the first string begins with the second string.
Contains	String	Test whether the first string contains the second string.
Ends With	String	Test whether the first string ends with the second string.
Equal	Boolean, Integer, Real, String, and Timestamp.	The two values are the same.
Greater Than	Boolean, Integer, Real, String, and Timestamp.	The first value is greater than the second value.
Greater Than or Equal	Boolean, Integer, Real, String, and Timestamp.	The first value is greater than the second value, or the two values are the same.
Less Than	Boolean, Integer, Real, String, and Timestamp.	The first value is less than the second value.
Less Than or Equal	Boolean, Integer, Real, String, and Timestamp.	The first value is less than the second value, or the two values are the same.
Not Equal	Boolean, Integer, Real, String, and Timestamp.	The two values are different. Null values will be ignored. When using the Not Equal relation you must perform a null check if comparing fields that can be null, otherwise null values will not be returned. The class_is_attribute_null Built-in can be used to perform the null check, for example:
Regular Expression	String	For string values, check whether the first string matches the wild card string or Perl regular expression in the second string.

Spatial Relationships

A Spatial Relationship is a type of Relation only applied to Values that are Geometries. It returns true if the geometries have the specified Relation.

Any type of geometry can be passed into a Spatial Relationship check, but only the geometry types relevant to this Spatial Relationship will be tested. For example, if comparing areas, line geometries will not be tested.

Note: Some Spatial Relationships can be considered subsets of others. For example, "Covered By" is a subset of "Within" (if a geometry is "Covered By" another geometry, it is also "Within" that geometry).

Geometry Basics for Spatial Relations

The detailed description of each Spatial Relationship uses the terms interior, boundary, exterior. Understanding the details in this table will help you when using Spatial Relationships. Additionally, see Geometries for more detailed information on Geometry types and support in 1Integrate.

Geometry Basic	Description
Interior	All points of the geometry, excluding the boundary the boundary.
Exterior	Any points that are not part of the geometry, can include the space inside of an interior ring.
Boundaries	The following examples of boundaries may not immediately be clear
Point	A zero dimensional object that has no boundary.
Lines and curves	Lines and curves have boundaries at their end points. A single line would have two endpoint boundaries. A geometry represented by two intersecting lines would have a boundary represented by the four endpoints.
Polygon	The boundary for a polygon would be its outer ring. Any inner rings would also form part of the boundary.
Rings	A ring, where the start and end point are the same, has no boundary.
Solid	The boundary of a solid is formed by its polygonal surfaces.

Spatial Relationships

Within the following dropdown you can find descriptions of the types of spatial relationships available to you in 1Integrate.

We recommend you familiarise yourself with the Geometry Basics for Spatial Relations first.

Types of Spatial Relationships

Spatial Relationship	Description	Supported Geometry types
Contains/Covers/Equals
Spatial Contains	Spatial Contains checks that another geometry is completely inside this line, polygon or solid (one object's boundary and interior are both inside another). Spatial Contains geometries Note: Contains is the reciprocal of Within. Note: Boundaries are allowed to intersect, so it includes the Covers and Spatial Equals Relations.	Area contains area Area contains line Area contains point Line contains line Line contains point Point contains point Solid contains solid Solid contains area Solid contains line Solid contains point
Within	Within checks if a geometry is completely inside the other, which must be a line or polygon. Within geometries Note: Within is the reciprocal of Contains. Note: Boundaries are allowed to intersect, so it includes the Covered by and Spatial Equals Relations.	Area within area Line within area Line within line Point within area Point within line Point within point Solid within solid Area within solid Line within solid Point within solid
Covers	Covers is true when another geometry is contained within this one, and their boundaries intersect (so they share some boundary). Note: Covers is the reciprocal of Covered By. Note: Covers is a special case of Spatial Contains.	Area covers area Area covers line Line covers line Solid covers solid
Covered By	Covered By is only true when this geometry is contained within another, and their boundaries intersect (so they share some boundary). Note: Covered By is the reciprocal of Covers. Note: Covered By is a special case of Within.	Area covered by area Line covered by area Line covered by line Solid covered by solid
Spatial Equals	Two geometries are Spatial Equals when they are identical (they have the same interior, boundary and exterior). The following is true of Spatial Equals: Geometries do not need to have the same number of vertices (as long as they follow the same path, within geometric tolerance). Lines do not need to have the same direction. Polygon boundaries do not have to use the same start/end vertex in order to be equal. Spatial Equals supports full 3D geometries. Spatial Equals geometries Note: Spatial Equals is a special case of Spatial Contains. Note: The order of the geometries does not matter. Example: Comparing a solid with an identical physical shell will return false as the geometry types need to be the same. e.g. a solid geometry does not equal the boundary of the solid.	Area and area Line and line Point and point Solid and solid
Cross/Overlap/Touch
Crosses	Two geometries Cross when a line runs across the boundary of an area, or the interior of another line. Cross geometries Note: At least one of the geometries must be a line. Note: The order of the geometries does not matter.	Line and line: A line crosses another line if only their interiors intersect at single points (and at the same height). Area and line: A line crosses a polygon geometry if its interior intersects the polygon’s interior and either of the line’s endpoints are outside the polygon.
Overlaps	Two geometries Overlap when two lines, areas or solids partly overlay each other. Overlap means geometries are partly inside and partly outside each other (so does not include being contained or being equal). Overlap supports full 3D geometries. Overlaps geometries Note: The order of the geometries does not matter.	Area and area: A polygon overlaps another polygon if it shares some but not all of its area. Line and line: A line overlaps another line if it shares some but not all of its length. Solid and solid: A solid overlaps another solid if it shares some, but not all, of its volume. If a solid is contained entirely within another then they are not deemed to overlap.
Touches	Touches checks that the boundaries intersect but the interiors do not. Touches supports full 3D geometries. Adjacent polygons or end-to-end lines touch. Touch geometries Note: The order of the geometries does not matter.	Area and area Area and line Area and point Line and line Line and point Solid and area Solid and line Solid and point
Intersects/Disjoint
Intersects	Intersects checks for any sort of spatial interaction. It checks that either the boundaries or interiors of two geometries intersect in any way, using any of the following Relations: Spatial Contains/Within Covers/Covered By Spatial Equals Crosses Overlaps Touches Intersect supports full 3D geometries. For 3D solids, if another geometry is wholly within the interior of the solid, it is deemed to intersect. Note: Intersects is the opposite of Disjoint. Note: The order of the geometries does not matter.	All
Disjoint	Disjoint checks that the geometries do not intersect at all (neither the boundaries nor the interiors intersect). Disjoint supports 3D geometries. Note: Disjoint is the opposite of Intersects. Note: The order of the geometries does not matter.	All
Distance
Within Distance	Within Distance checks that a geometry approaches within a specified minimum distance of another (specified in dataset units). Within Distance supports 3D geometries. Note: Within Distance is the opposite of Beyond. Note: The order of the geometries does not matter.	All
Beyond	Beyond checks that a geometry is at least a certain distance away from another (specified in dataset units). Beyond supports 3D geometries. Note: Beyond is the opposite of Within Distance. Note: The order of the geometries does not matter.	All

Spatial Relationships in 3D

Most of the Spatial Relationships in 1Integrate support 3D data, and generally have the same meaning as their 2D counterparts.

Note: Spatial Relationships will behave differently if the geometry is a solid or if it is a multi-surface. for more information about full 3D data in 1Integrate, please see Full 3D Support.

Note: If you are loading 2.5D data, and not true 3D, then Spatial Relationships will be calculated in 2D. For example, 2.5D geometries will intersect if they intersect in 2D, regardless of height. To compare geometries in 3D they will nee to be loaded as True 3D Geometries.