Encoding Large RCC8 Scenarios Using Rectangular Pseudo-Solutions

Most approaches in the field of qualitative spatial reasoning (QSR) use constraint networks to encode spatial scenarios. The size of these networks is quadratic in the number of variables, which has severely limited the real-world application of QSR. In this paper, we propose another representation of spatial scenarios, in which each variable is associated with one or more rectangles. Instead of requiring these rectangles to define a solution of the corresponding constraint network, we construct sequences of rectangles that define partial solutions to progressively weaker constraint networks. We present experimental results that illustrate the effectiveness of this strategy.