cc: "peter.thorne" , "Kate Willett" , "Phil Jones" , "Dick Dee" , "Kate Willett" date: Sun, 12 Apr 2009 12:29:10 +0100 (BST) from: P.Jones@uea.ac.uk subject: Re: First draft of ERA/HadCRUH paper to: "Adrian Simmons" Dear All, Here are a few comments on bthe draft Adrian sent around on Thursday. I've added some comments into the comments from Peter or Adrian's response. When I've done this it is in italics. Hope all is clear. Hope also that you're all enjoying Easter, if the weather (apart from Good Friday when it got to 20C in Norwich) isn't that good. Cheers Phil > Just a brief update. I've done three things to the paper this week: > > (i) Made the simpler of the changes suggested by Peter, and placed the > others on hold for a few days; > (ii) Checked the time-lag of the separate land/sea time series, and > confirmed that correlations between the two series are stronger for land > lagging sea than vice versa; > (iii) Tidied up the comparison of GPCC and GPCP/CMAP. From the GPCC > website I discovered I could download the GPCC's "Monitoring Product" > which according to the site is the version used by GPCP (from 1986 up to > the end of 2006, at least - the downloadable dataset switches to > "Version 2" for 2007 and 2008). It must also be the version used by CMAP > also, as variations over time are very similar for GPCP, CMAP and the > monitoring product. I've modified Fig. 11 to show the (far fewer) gauge > numbers used in the Monitoring product, and made a few changes to the > text accordingly. > > I attach the latest version, though I'm quite happy still to take > comments on the earlier one. > > Adrian > > > peter.thorne wrote: >> Dear Adrian, >> >> there's some really interesting stuff in here. I'd definitely suggest >> JGR as first home with J. Clim as a reserve. JGR would probably put the >> appendix as Supp Info and allow some of your other "not shown"s to be >> submitted as supp info if inclined which may be a way forwards if its >> felt any is sufficiently important. >> >> As Phil or Kate will confirm, my modus operandi is to provide lots of >> suggestions so please don't be alarmed at the amount of inline comments >> when you open the attached. I don't foresee any show stoppers based upon >> taking most of today to read through it. >> >> Major suggestions would be: >> >> 1. Alight on a central theme to re-order around so that the paper >> narrative is clearer as that will make it easier for a reader. The >> RH/=constant is an obvious theme. Then rewrite in particular your >> abstract and discussion around such a theme. At the moment the text >> feels a little directionless in some places I guess because you wrote it >> in half hour availability slots and whilst the analysis was ongoing. >> >> 2. Do more on your sea leads land hypothesis so we can back it up more >> quantitatively. A lead lag correlation analysis should support it and >> seems relatively trivial. There may be other analyses that we could do >> relatively easily that provide some better quantitative support. We >> don't want another Wentz et al precip trends type situation where >> something goes out and gets high profile and then later nobody truly >> believes. >> >> 3. Pull out your ERA-40 ERA_interim differences discussion that occurs >> in several places into a table (and maybe figure) that clearly >> encapsulates the differences between the two products (model spec, obs >> input, treatment of obs etc.) in one place. I think this would make it >> more useful as a resource and more understandable to the target audience >> and reduce the text somewhat. >> >> 4. Try to reduce cross-talk between text and figure captions for brevity >> and for readability. >> >> 5. Cut out cases where we are leaving obvious low hanging fruit issues >> that interested parties with a political persuasion could abuse. We're >> better to avoid leaving ourselves open incase we suddenly find this >> paper at the centre of a blogstorm (Phil will attest to this). >> >> Lastly, procedural issues that we have to abide by so you have a heads >> up now rather than a last minute panic: >> >> 1. The inserted acknowledgement is required. >> >> 2. We need to push it through internal Met Office review before it can >> be submitted. This means putting it under David Parker and Peter Stott's >> noses and our making changes to their satisfaction. On the plus side >> this soft review means less probability of heartache when we come to >> gambling at the external reviewer long table. >> >> 3. We will have to sign crown copyright forms and the work will be crown >> copyright as a result of our involvement. Both candidate journals have >> well bedded down procedures in place to this end. >> >> Peter >> > > -- > -------------------------------------------------- > Adrian Simmons > European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts > Shinfield Park, Reading, RG2 9AX, UK > Phone: +44 118 949 9700 > Fax: +44 118 986 9450 > -------------------------------------------------- > Attachment Converted: "c:\eudora\attach\qpaper_pwt_ajs_pdj.doc"