# Title Add new integer types to CF (From Trac ticket #[166](https://cf-trac.llnl.gov/trac/ticket/166))
# Moderator # Moderator Status Review [last updated: 10 Feb 2020 - @ethanrd ] This enhancement was first suggested by @czender on the CF email list in September 2017 ([here](http://mailman.cgd.ucar.edu/pipermail/cf-metadata/2017/009487.html)). That discussion was split and moved to two Trac tickets in Oct 2017: * Trac Ticket #[166](https://cf-trac.llnl.gov/trac/ticket/166) (“Add new integer types to CF”) * Trac Ticket #[167](https://cf-trac.llnl.gov/trac/ticket/167) (“Use of valid_range to indicate unsigned integers”) After some discussion and a few minor changes, both Trac ticket 166 and 167 were, I believe, agreed upon without objection. Due to the move from Trac to GitHub the changes were not incorporated into the CF document. This GitHub issue addresses the remaining changes agreed on in Trac ticket #[166](https://cf-trac.llnl.gov/trac/ticket/166). [I will add a GitHub issue to address Trac ticket #[167](https://cf-trac.llnl.gov/trac/ticket/167) shortly.] # Requirement Summary # Technical Proposal Summary Add support in CF for the five “new” integer types supported by netCDF-4 (and now in netCDF-3 with the CDF5 encoding released in netCDF-C version 4.4.0). The five “new” integer types are: `unsigned byte`, `unsigned short`, `unsigned int`, `int64`, and `unsigned int64`. # Benefits Explicit support for unsigned integer types # Status Quo All integer types are assumed to be signed unless one of several workarounds/conventions are followed. # Detailed Proposal Change the first paragraph of Section 2.2 "Data Types" as follows: * Add the five “new” integer types in the list of acceptable data types. * Add ‘unsigned byte’ to the sentence on one byte numeric data. * Remove the sentence stating that all integer types are treated as unsigned. See PR ??? (coming soon) -- You are receiving this because you are subscribed to this thread. Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub: https://github.com/cf-convention/cf-conventions/issues/243 This list forwards relevant notifications from Github. It is distinct from [email protected], although if you do nothing, a subscription to the UCAR list will result in a subscription to this list. To unsubscribe from this list only, send a message to [email protected].
