Abstract
SOLAP systems are technologies intended to support geographic business intelligence. They allow decision-makers to explore and analyze a large amount of geo-referenced data usually through interactive browsing user interfaces. In this paper, we explore a new interactive methodology which supports users to query and aggregate this kind of structured data by means of specific visual notations. The widely recognized capability of visual query languages to bridge the gap between users' expertise and advanced query formulation adds effectiveness to the methodology, thus providing a useful support for posing correct SOLAP expressions by spatially arranging visual metaphors in a simple and intuitive way. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2010.