Methods, systems, and articles of manufacture for referencing a selection of data including a plurality of individual data points (e.g., database cells) are provided. Rather than store a reference to each individual data point, only sufficient information necessary to describe a bounding edge of the data selection (an "edge definition") may be stored, thus significantly reducing the amount of storage. Depending on the application, edge definitions may be used to describe two-dimensional or higher order selections of data.