[CF-metadata] Sea surface height

From: Jonathan Gregory <j.m.gregory>
Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2012 11:51:05 +0000

Dear all

I did not mean to imply that "anomaly" was not the right term in that
application - apologies to Stephane and Bert - but that it isn't the way
that word is used in existing CF standard names, and we try to be consistent.
As Philip implies, we might change our mind about the past, and if we really
need to do so, we can define aliases. We could could rename the four existing
_anomaly standard names as, for instance, _difference_from_climatology, in
order to be a bit clearer. We could discuss that in a separate email thread.

On this subject, picking up Roy's point, what about
  sea_surface_height_above_predicted_tidal_level
There is no need to record the tidal level itself. (As far as I can see, we
don't have standard names for the tide yet.) However, I am not certain that
"predicted" is really necessary. Isn't the tidal level the same geophysical
quantity, regardless of whether it is measured or predicted? We don't have
names distinguishing measurements and predictions in general. So on the whole
I still prefer
  sea_surface_height_above_tidal_level

Best wishes

Jonathan
Received on Fri Jan 27 2012 - 04:51:05 GMT