Abstract: A subset of the attributes of water element data in national geographic census are not clear, the current solution to this problem is manual filling which is inefficient and liable to make mistakes. So this paper proposes an automatic correction algorithm of water element attribute. Based on the analysis of the structure characteristics and topological relation, we put forward three basic principles of correction which include network proximity, structure robustness and topology ductility. Based on the WJ-Ⅲ map workstation which is developed by Chinese Academy of Surveying and Mapping, we realize the automatic correction of water elements. Finally, practical data are used to validate the method. The results show that our method is highly reasonable and efficient.

Key words: national geographic census, attribute correction, structural river network, river network selection