Locationdirection

Locationdirection is a concept used in navigation and geospatial sciences to describe a simultaneous specification of a location and an orientation. It combines geographic coordinates with a directional reference, such as a bearing or a facing vector, to indicate not only where something is, but which way it is oriented or moving.

In data terms, locationdirection typically comprises a location component (latitude, longitude, and optionally altitude) and a direction component (bearing, azimuth, or a unit vector). Some representations encode direction as a three-dimensional orientation (pitch, yaw, roll) or as a quaternion in 3D space. Distances may be included to express how far the entity is from a reference point.

Uses include autonomous navigation, robotics, augmented reality, and geospatial tagging, where systems must reason about both position and orientation. For example, an AR annotation might include the device's geographic location and the direction it is facing to determine where to render the label.

In GIS and mapping, locationdirection supports tasks such as path planning, visibility analysis, and spatial querying that depend on the entity's orientation. Data standards vary, with common formats storing coordinates in a defined coordinate reference system and a separate orientation field.

See also: bearing, azimuth, geotagging, geospatial coordinate reference system, orientation, vector.