STV stands for Space Time Volume
TE stands for Territorial Entity
Political Relations can be direct (DPR), indirect (IDR), group (GDR) according to #38
Using one admin_level for all groups (coalitions, alliances, etc.) would be sufficient enough. Groups would not be shown automatically, they would appear on map in case they were selected by user in some menu or chosen by narrative author. Groups would be marked as first admin_level in database. Groups will not have STV’s as they would be represented as Group Political Relations.
Second admin_level would be default for countries. Next admin_levels should be used for deeper administrative units. All of territories (TE + STV) with admin_level > 1 can be represented if a few different ways.
For example we create Territorial Entity of United Kingdom as admin_level = 2 and as for deeper administrative units we think of the UK’s territories [Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland, England]. We have two options to represent it then:
Scotland ,Wales, Northern Ireland territories mapped. In this case we will create two STV’s one for Territorial Entity called England with DPR to UK, and the second one for UK with rest of the territories.Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland, England] with Direct Political Relations to United Kingdom. 5 Territorial Entities and 4 STV’s[!] As the result of using inheritance of territories based on admin_level deepness, each Atomic Polygon should be used only once among all of the STV’s for selected time period.
Table of admin levels
| Admin Level | Usage |
|---|---|
| = 1 | coalitions, unions, alliances, supranational organizations |
| = 2 | nations, empires, kingdoms, countries |
| = 3 | regions as deeper administrative units |
| = 4 | (please fill here) |
| >= 5 | we won’t use these for the MVP |
Why we should not create STV for territories that are already mapped on a deeper levels?
Main idea: it would be better to have one source of truth for maps. If borders were changed on deeper admin levels it would immediately affect countries and groups.
For displaying map properly while exploring it at the admin_level = 2 when we store a redundant STV’s all foreign territories with Direct Political Relations (like colonies) should be included as parents territory and parent should be updated each time colony has claimed new territory. This will result in creating a separate STV for parent each time.
Mapbox MVT layer used on frontend for visualization requires us to map AP only once per layer.
Zoom levels are currently restricted from 1 (zoomed out) to 8 (zoomed in). Admin level changes automatically for territories that have its regions mapped.
| Admin Level | Zoom Level | Type of TE |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | manual toggle | coalitions, unions, alliances, supranational organizations |
| 2 | < 3.5 | nations, empires, kingdoms, countries |
| 3 | >= 3.5 | regions as deeper administrative units |