Re: How to associate attributes with fields in netCDF-4 compound types?

• To: netcdf-hdf@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
• Subject: Re: How to associate attributes with fields in netCDF-4 compound types?
• From: Ed Hartnett <ed@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
• Date: Tue, 31 Oct 2006 04:46:42 -0700

Simon Wood <simon.wood@xxxxxxxxxx> writes:

> Hi NetCDF-4 folks,
>
> We're been thinking about using compound types in some of our new
> datasets and have been puzzling over how to add attributes to compound
> variables.
>
> We expected to be able to specify attributes on a per *field* basis
> but I get the definite impression this is not actually going to be
> possible...  attributes can be global, per group, per variable but it
> seems thats it.  Is this so?
>
> Has anybody else been thinking about metadata for compound types?  How
> is metadata expected to be represented for individual fields?  Surely
> something as basic the ability to specify different units for each
> field has been considered?  Or have we got this whole compound types
> idea wrong?
>
> Any thoughts most gratefully received.
>
> regards
>
> Simon Wood
>

We have considered adding specific support for units attributes for
compound types.

However, this would expand the interface quite a bit.

We have also considered that one could create an attribute of compound
type, in which each element was a unit for an element of the data
compound type.

Ed

-- 
Ed Hartnett  -- ed@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

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  • How to associate attributes with fields in netCDF-4 compound types?
    • From: Simon Wood