[Go-essp-tech] Close to final proposal for global attributes for downscaled datasets

[galina]

Dear all,

After our teleconference on 03/20 and the email exchange, suggestions 
and questions posed by Karl Taylor, Laura Carriere and Martin Juckes, 
there was a need to prepare a final proposal for the set of global 
attributes to be used when publishing statistically downscaled data in 
ESGF.

In order to standardize the elements of the DRS for publishing 
downscaled datasets Joe Barsugli and Galia Guentchev evaluated the 
global attributes used by CORDEX, the additions/corrections proposed by 
Karl Taylor and the initially proposed global attributes for publishing 
of downscaled datasets. We prepared a divergence table that summarizes 
all of these details. The table is attached to this email.  The last 
column contains a Final proposal of the global attributes for 
consideration. At the bottom of this table we also added some NEW global 
attributes that we consider important for inclusion.

The differences from the proposal we discussed and agreed on during the 
last teleconference (03/20) stem from the desire for standardization and 
consistency as much as possible with CORDEX and to an extent with the 
CMIP5 DRS requirements.

The main difference is in the approach to use the standard global 
attributes such as experiment_ID, model_ID when describing the 
downscaling characteristics (experiment, and statistical or dynamical 
downscaling model); the main reasoning for using model_ID being that 
users would look for all data most often under model_ID and this is 
where we would like for them to be able to find  also all of the 
downscaled data listed. To describe the global attributes pertaining to 
the global model that was used as a predictor or a driving model (in 
dynamical downscaling) we are proposing to use the descriptor "driving" 
to distinguish these specific global attributes.

Also, instead of having a separate sub-project, we propose that this 
information is included in the experiment_ID (which in this proposal is 
intended to describe the downscaling experiment and the downscaling 
setting); We also include "perfectModel" descriptor in the "product" 
global attribute to distinguish the applicability of the downscaled data 
for impact applications; Although, we already received a comment by 
Aparna that indicated a concern regarding this last proposed addition.

Please take a look at the table and send any comments or suggestions 
that you might have. We would like to expedite the decision on the list 
of final global attributes, so that the NASA team would be able to 
publish their data soon.
We are hoping to reach an agreement on the final set of global 
attributes via email within the next few days.


Best regards,
Galia
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