Abstract: In the past two decades，directional relation has received great attention in many areas，such as computer science，geographic information science，artificial intelligence，robotics，databases，multimedia，and so on.Many typical models have been proposed for description of directional relations between spatial objects.This paper is focused on the review of computational models of direction relations and their applications in GIS spatial query，spatial analysis and spatial reasoning.It is pointed out that most models only approximately capture directional relations between extended spatial objects（i.e. line and area），because extended spatial objects are represented too coarsely either in terms of their MBRs or as a point，with exception of the statistical model of directional relation which is developed based on spatial objects themselves.Several issues are highlighted for future investigations.