[CF-metadata] Proposed CF standard names for the NEMO ocean model

From: Jonathan Gregory <j.m.gregory>
Date: Mon, 11 Aug 2008 11:26:18 +0100

Dear Ian

> So, apart from T14, I think we're agreed.

Splendid. On T14, I'll agree with you that it is helpful to indicate what sort
of depth it is. The fact that it is the depth of an isotherm is a main point of
the definition of the quantity, whereas temperature on sigma levels and
temperature on pressure levels are really the same quantity, just like
temperature on a lat-lon grid and temperature on a tripolar grid are the
same quantity.

However I'd like to suggest an alternative to ocean_isotherm_depth. What do
you think of depth_of_isosurface_of_sea_water_temperature? This is of course
not the common term but my aim is not to be obscure. I am thinking of
(a) precision; "isotherm" might mean potential or in-situ temperature, I guess.
(b) generality. Any quantity that is defined as a function of z might be
inverted in this way. While "isotherm" is a fairly familiar word, we don't
want to have to depend on the existence of a Greek-based "iso" word in order
to name a quantity. Does "isosurface" have an obvious meaning to you? It turns
out to be a word that is in common use with this meaning e.g. IDL and ncar
graphics both use the term, and it's in wikipedia.

If this is too user-unfriendly I'll settle for ocean_isotherm_depth and if we
have later problems we can sort it out with aliases.

Cheers

Jonathan
Received on Mon Aug 11 2008 - 04:26:18 BST