An integrated database system at the national level for water resource engineers and planners of Bangladesh

This paper discusses practical issues of developing and implementing an integrated database system that contains water resources data having both space and time varying characteristics. This database has been the National Databank for all the data sets relating water resources planning. The logical inter-dependencies between temporal and spatial data sets have been modelled exploiting RDBMS techniques, but with an unusual approach, to make the system aligned with the actual planning process. The integrated design approach has made it possible to develop a number of tools for engineers and planners to support their assessments and decision-making efforts. A metadatabase has been developed using Internet technology on top of the whole system. The work presented in this paper clearly indicates the potential of developing such databases to expedite any process that deals with a wide array of heterogeneous engineering data sets.