Dear Lars Answers to some of your points:
> 1. Is there a standard name for "diurnal temperature range", or a combined > standard name/cell method representation? Cf. the 2010 mail archive thread > http://mailman.cgd.ucar.edu/pipermail/cf-metadata/2010/054016.html that added > "range" to Appendix E. The cell_method of range was approved in ticket 65 http://cf-trac.llnl.gov/trac/ticket/65 and will be added in CF 1.7, which is under preparation. You could use this, in combination with time bounds, to describe a diurnal range. > 2. 'Heating Degree Days' and similar: I take it this was resolved/decided to > have standard name "integral_of_air_temperature_deficit_wrt_time" (or > ..._excess_...), with canonical units K s in this post > http://mailman.cgd.ucar.edu/pipermail/cf-metadata/2005/051014.html . However, > as the threshold is not explicitly referred to in the standard name, how is > this linkage formally established? A practical example would be helpful. The data variable of the integral should have a scalar coordinate variable or a size-one coordinate variable with the standard name of air_temperature_ threshold, to indicate the threshold. I agree, this should be in the description of the integral standard names. > 3. Several of the standard names directly targeted at climate indices (e.g. > "spell_length_.....", "number_of_days_...") are dimensionless because the > unit is already included in the standard name. This is of course consistent > and parsimonious in terms of describing the data. But with respect of a > software package producing a plot that needs a legend with units attached, it > is not very enlightening to have the unit "1". For example, in a map of Frost > Days the title drawn from the long name or the comment may be something like > "Number of Frost Days (Tmin < 0 degC)" but the color scale should preferably > have units "days" rather than "1". As this is not specific to climate > indices, what is the CF accepted advice or solution to this? The spell_length variables have canonical units of days. The number_of_days variables have canonical units of 1, as you say. This is logical. Could you use the standard name, including the phrase "number_of_days", to derive the appropriate label? Best wishes Jonathan _______________________________________________ CF-metadata mailing list [email protected] http://mailman.cgd.ucar.edu/mailman/listinfo/cf-metadata
