Supported spatial objects

Vertica supports two spatial data types. These data types store two- and three-dimensional spatial objects in a table column:

• GEOMETRY: Spatial object with coordinates expressed as (x,y) pairs, defined in the Cartesian plane. All calculations use Cartesian coordinates.
• GEOGRAPHY: Spatial object defined as on the surface of a perfect sphere, or a spatial object in the WGS84 coordinate system. Coordinates are expressed in longitude/latitude angular values, measured in degrees. All calculations are in meters. For perfect sphere calculations, the sphere has a radius of 6371 kilometers, which approximates the shape of the earth.

  Note

  Some spatial programs use an ellipsoid to model the earth, resulting in slightly different data.

The maximum size of a GEOMETRY or GEOGRAPHY data type is 10,000,000 bytes (10 MB). You cannot use either data type as a table's primary key.