[CF-metadata] New standard name: datetime_iso8601

From: Aleksandar Jelenak - NOAA Affiliate <aleksandar.jelenak>
Date: Wed, 20 Mar 2013 22:41:13 -0400

Dear Jonathan,

On Tue, Mar 19, 2013 at 3:34 PM, Jonathan Gregory
<j.m.gregory at reading.ac.uk> wrote:
> Is the proposal for the use of date-time strings in auxiliary coordinate variables only, not in (Unidata) coordinate variables,
> to provide a human-readable equivalent to the encoded time coordinate variable?

Not exclusively. It could be used for that purpose but I would not
elevate it to the level of an auxiliary coordinate. My intention was
to standardize on a subset of ISO8601 datetime string formats that
can be used for such data and thought a standard name is the most
benevolent method of achieving that.

> Is the proposal only for the real-world calendar, or do you also propose the
> date-time strings to be valid for model calendars? I guess the ISO standard
> only applies to the real world.

ISO8601 assumes the Gregorian calendar so I would say that it is for
the real-world calendar. It does mention the proleptic Gregorian for
dates before 1582-10-15 but I cannot be sure how well it supports it.
I work with data no older than the 1970s so have no experience with
any other calendar.

> I agree that this would not be a fundamental change to the convention. It
> would be a material change, however, if there were new requirements such as
> above; those would be additional rules in the convention, so they'd need to be
> proposed in a trac ticket.
>
> This email list is where standard name proposals are discussed. I agree that
> a standard name for strings of this kind would be needed.

I think that a standard name will be enough. Like any other standard
name, don't use it if you don't need/like it.

       -Aleksandar
Received on Wed Mar 20 2013 - 20:41:13 GMT