Just a couple of questions:
Do people think that the use of the "_content" syntax should be depricated?
If not, why is it that we need to have a different syntactical structure for
atmosphere totals?
If the usage in the IPCC reports are not significant, what kind of evidence of
previous usage would be considered meaningful?
cheers,
Martin
On Friday 22 February 2008 19:00, Philip J. Cameronsmith1 wrote:
>
> Hi Karl, Johnathan, Martin, at al.,
>
> I don't want to make a big deal out of this either, so let me say up front
> that I would be happy with both options.
>
> If we have to choose which is better then...
>
> To me, "burden" can be either a mass or number per unit area (common in
> vertical observation discussions), OR a mass or number per unit volume
> (typically the whole atmosphere or the whole stratosphere or
> whole troposphere) which is common in modeling discussions. The meaning
> is usually obvious from the context or units, and can obviously be
> defined precisely for CF.
>
> When I parse the two options (atmosphere_mole_burden_of_X
> moles_of_X_in_atmosphere) they contain almost the same words:
>
> atmosphere, moles, X, [IN or BURDEN]
>
> The difference is whether one uses 'in' or 'burden'. To me 'in' is
> obvious to everyone, while 'burden' will only be obvious to people in
> the field. 'in' is also shorter, and the meaning of 'burden' also
> overlaps that of 'atmosphere' and 'moles' and so takes me a little longer
> to parse.
>
> I would therefore give moles_of_X_in_atmosphere the edge when considered
> in isolation.
>
> But I consider it to be just a small edge which can easily be trumped by
> consideration of consistency within CF, IPCC, and other widely read
> documents.
>
> Just my 2cents,
>
> Philip
>
>
>
> On Fri, 22 Feb 2008, Karl Taylor wrote:
>
> > Dear Jonathan and Martin,
> >
> > I don't normally wade in muddy waters, but perhaps a separate
> > perspective would be useful. Problem is that I'm hopelessly uneducated
> > in this area.
> >
> > I always thought that "burden" referred to some amount (either moles per
> > unit area or mass per unit area) of a chemical species in the *entire
> > atmospheric column*, extending from the surface to the top of the
> > atmosphere. Is this correct?
> >
> > If it is invariably the total column amount, then I think
> > atmosphere_mole_burden_of_X is a more specific definition than
> > moles_of_X_in_atmosphere, which I should think could refer to moles per
> > unit area or moles per unit volume, or even total number of moles in
> > some limited region of the atmosphere. Of course the units attribute
> > should make this clear.
> >
> > If, on the other hand, atmosphere_mole_burden_of_X is more general than
> > total column amount per unit area, then I think moles_of_X_in_atmosphere
> > is better because it is plainer English.
> >
> > Forgive me, if you've already gone over this ground before.
> >
> > cheers,
> > Karl
> >
> >
> > Martin Juckes wrote:
> >> Dear Jonathan,
> >>
> >> thanks, we'll see if there are any other comments. But I don't think it
is
> >> fair to refer to the IPCC as a specialist community. I keep referring to
the
> >> usage there because it has gone through exhaustive review and is designed
for
> >> a wider audience than, for instance, articles in JGR which really are
> >> targetted at a specialist community.
> >>
> >> cheers,
> >> Martin
> >>
> >>> From: Jonathan Gregory <j.m.gregory at reading.ac.uk>
> >>> Subject: [CF-metadata] standard name proposal for CCMVal
> >>> To: cf-metadata at cgd.ucar.edu
> >>> Message-ID: <20080222135725.GA12861 at met.reading.ac.uk>
> >>> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
> >>
> >>> Dear Martin
> >>
> >>> There have been many questions like this in the past, and there's not a
right
> >>> answer to be discovered - it's just a judgement. I agreed with you about
> >>> "burden" before anyway, as you know; I took it up again because we had
not
> >>> had that discussion on this email list and because "burden" was
questioned
> >>> again. On the one side is the usage in the specialist field, and on the
other
> >>> is what is most readily understood by non-specialists, which is
important too
> >>> because CF metadata is used across disciplines. CF stdnames are
somewhere
> >>> between terminology and definitions, I think. Terminology is convenient,
> >>> while definitions are self-describing.
> >>
> >>> Anyway, if the majority is for "burden" that's fine with me.
> >>
> >>> Cheers
> >>
> >>> Jonathan
> >> _______________________________________________
> >> CF-metadata mailing list
> >> CF-metadata at cgd.ucar.edu
> >> http://mailman.cgd.ucar.edu/mailman/listinfo/cf-metadata
> >>
> > _______________________________________________
> > CF-metadata mailing list
> > CF-metadata at cgd.ucar.edu
> > http://mailman.cgd.ucar.edu/mailman/listinfo/cf-metadata
> >
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Dr Philip Cameron-Smith Energy & Environment Directorate
> pjc at llnl.gov Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
> +1 925 4236634 7000 East Avenue, Livermore, CA94550, USA
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>
Received on Sat Feb 23 2008 - 12:07:44 GMT
