David, Thanks for the comments. I initially proposed a standard name modifier and it was not well accepted by the audiences I presented to. I think a standard name modifier is a more difficult and confusing way to use the standard names, and would require updating the CF document every time we want to add a new name. That is significantly more difficult than adding a standard name (which is not a trivial process). If we want to use some other attribute that's fine. I was trying to keep the number of new attributes to a minimum. I also don't want to develop a new system to track names. We could use cf_role, but I get worried about overloading attributes with too many different concepts.
There is no standard uncertainty. This is the crux of the problem. There are literally thousands of ways to derive uncertainty so we can't be too specific with the definitions. That's why using standard_error standard name modifier will not be enough. "the square root of the sum of squares" is just the component sum method to add values. It only works if the values are independent, which may or may not be the case. Whether we use specific_ or component_ doesn't matter to me. Someone will not like whichever one is chosen. That's just how it goes. I got the term from someone else. I think the confidence interval needs to be listed as the full range for a confidence value to be calculated. It's a scalar because the same interval is used for all values. The value listed in the variable would be half the range centered on the middle of the range. I don't think the details matter that much, just that the variable indicates the values are from a 95% confidence range. I see the cell_methods as just a high level indication of what is going on. There are many other decisions made in the calculation that are not indicated in cell_methods (e.g. how was missing data treated, was QC applied). I don't follow the concern with ancillary variables. I assume the cell methods attribute describes the process to create the values in the variable. So of course the method listed in cell_methods would need to work on the data variable. Thanks for the comments, Ken -- You are receiving this because you are subscribed to this thread. Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub: https://urldefense.us/v3/__https://github.com/cf-convention/cf-conventions/issues/320*issuecomment-844176009__;Iw!!G2kpM7uM-TzIFchu!lU5i4s0sF50Yt0FqDPxseXHX0DtA4SZzHZLMV_TETPrBaQKGie3GzlhpKkiYsUeD9nsacGZsews$ 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].
