Hi Karl
Despite Jonathan's well reasoned arguments against moving away from the status quo, I am of the opinion that "something has to be done". (While still being *very* appreciative of the effort that goes into the definitions and the distinctions, I think that very effort makes the addition of new categories seem more of a hurdle than it might well be, thus stopping folk getting on the starting grid, and concentrating on those definitions).
I am happy with a flat name list, *provided* it represents some structure, and that new structure can be added *where appropriate* (which means not only in the standard name).
In truth, I don't much care about the "name", I care far more about the definition, and the way it was constructed, i.e. the semantic parts ... I've already put it thus (20 October): "So what I think is that if we carry on investing all our effort in agreeing the "meaningful identifier" instead of agreeing on the "definition it points to", CF will eventually grind to a stop ... which leads me to trying to introduce hierarchy earlier in the process, allowing us to abstract away some of the agony and spend time concentrating on a smaller part of the problem each time. I'm sure that'll be the way to go with chemistry, and in the longer run, for CF standard names in general. Common concept will help with some of this, but not all." (I need to magic some time from somewhere to make common concept happen.)
So, an unqualified yes from me, for
a) formalising the construction of standard names (this is not a big step, I believe Alison does a fair bit of this anyway, but what folk probalby don't realise is that having done that, a fair bit of the definition is formalised too). (While I appreciate Jonathans' examples, when we get faced by lots of new names, we could save a lot of time with this approach, leaving the best brain cells for the sorts of examples he lists).
(And I think Robert has already helped us here, and may yet do more :-)
b) yes for something like this:
> Any of these components of the standard_name might be omitted if either
> unnecessary, *or* if they themselves appeared as standard_names attached
> to one of the coordinate variables of the quantity. Thus, for example,
> if the "process' were left unspecified for a variable containing
> "tendency_or_air_temperature", but one of the coordinates of that
> variable had the standard_name "process", then one would find stored in
> this variable all the different processes identified by the coordinate
> labels for that coordinate. This allows us to store many different
> tendencies in a single variable, but allows us to identify each of them
> through the "process" dimension of that variable.
(or any other sub-part of a variable).
I think we might need to look further into the list of new components that Karl has introduced, but I'd rather agree the principle, than argue the actuality at this time.
Cheers
Bryan
--
Bryan Lawrence
Director of Environmental Archival and Associated Research
(NCAS/British Atmospheric Data Centre and NCEO/NERC NEODC)
STFC, Rutherford Appleton Laboratory
Phone +44 1235 445012; Fax ... 5848;
Web: home.badc.rl.ac.uk/lawrence
Received on Mon Nov 03 2008 - 07:04:07 GMT
