Russ (and thus core netcdf) has always been explicit about space-delimited conventions, so really there shouldn't be any conventions with spaces in the names.
On the other hand, we have adopted the technique of using the convention name as a pattern to match against the convention attribute, so that we do not care about delimiters. This, of course, will fail if someone has a convention name that is a substring of another convention name, and that convention is not a subset of the convention with the longer name. Benno On Thu, Dec 22, 2011 at 10:42 AM, Jim Biard <[email protected]> wrote: > It is "easier" (not by much, code-wise) to not to allow commas as > delimiters, but if you want to allow for machine-recognition of convention > names, how are you going to handle conventions that have spaces in their > names? Telling everyone else to get rid of spaces isn't a practical > solution, and you have just created a thornier problem for coders who have > to figure out which way someone dealt with forbidden spaces. > > > On 12/22/2011 10:18 AM, Nan Galbraith wrote: > >> Thanks Russ, Dave(s), Jonathan and Lorenzo - >> >> Thanks for the clarifications. I agree that it makes sense to >> require that convention names not contain spaces, and that >> it's easier (and more CF-like, hence better!) to parse space >> separated terms. >> >> Cheers - Nan >> >> The recommendation on the Unidata site for multiple conventions >>> >>> >>> http://www.unidata.ucar.edu/**netcdf/conventions.html<http://www.unidata.ucar.edu/netcdf/conventions.html> >>> >>> is to use spaces rather than commas: >>> >>> It is possible for a netCDF file to adhere to more than one set of >>> conventions, even when there is no inheritance relationship among the >>> conventions. In this case, the value of the `Conventions' attribute >>> may be a single text string containing a list of the convention names >>> separated by blank space (recommended) or commas (if a convention name >>> contains blanks), for example >>> >>> :Conventions = "XXX YYY" ; >>> >> >> >> On Dec/22/2011 6:01 AM, Lorenzo Bigagli wrote: >> >>> Hi all, >>> >>> my opinion is to keep with the current recommendation, which better >>> supports automatic parsing and the existing conforming datasets. >>> In particular, I would avoid any parsing rule for the conventions >>> attribute, keeping its syntax as simple as possible (as Jonathan points >>> out, blank-separated lists are more CF-like). >>> >>> I think it makes sense to require convention identifiers not to contain >>> spaces (as usual in identifiers). >>> Those conventions that have not followed Unidata recommendation may be >>> dealt with on a transitional basis (e.g. by means of specific parsing >>> exceptions), while they are aligned in a future revision. >>> >>> Best wishes, >>> LB >>> >>> Il giorno 22/dic/2011, alle ore 10:11, Jonathan Gregory ha scritto: >>> >>> Dear all >>>> >>>> The existing Unidata recommendation is OK and we could incorporate it >>>> into >>>> CF but it would help to be more precise, for instance: If the >>>> Conventions att >>>> includes no commas, it is interpreted as a blank-separated list of >>>> conventions; >>>> if it contains at least one comma, it is interpreted as a >>>> comma-separated list. >>>> Blank-separated lists are more CF-like - many CF attributes use that >>>> syntax - >>>> but obviously we can't insist that other conventions don't have blanks >>>> in their >>>> names, and it would be simpler therefore to use a comma-separated list >>>> for >>>> this attribute, despite the Unidata recommendation. >>>> >>>> >>> >> > -- > Jim Biard > > Government Contractor, STG Inc. > Remote Sensing and Applications Division (RSAD) > National Climatic Data Center > 151 Patton Ave. > Asheville, NC 28801-5001 > > [email protected] > 828-271-4900 > > > ______________________________**_________________ > CF-metadata mailing list > [email protected] > http://mailman.cgd.ucar.edu/**mailman/listinfo/cf-metadata<http://mailman.cgd.ucar.edu/mailman/listinfo/cf-metadata> > -- Dr. M. Benno Blumenthal [email protected] International Research Institute for climate and society The Earth Institute at Columbia University Lamont Campus, Palisades NY 10964-8000 (845) 680-4450
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