Session on the Future of ACDD at ESIP meeting (virtual), 20-23 Jan 2026

[ethanrd]

There will be a Future of the ACDD session during the ESIP meeting, 2023 January 2026, which will be held virtually. (Early registration for the ESIP meetings ends 22 Dec 2025.)

This relates to the CF Roadmap discussion on Discovery metadata (#394) where ACDD has come up.

[MathewBiddle]

Let us know if there is interest in participating!

cc @ksauby @mwengren

[cofinoa]

Hi @ethanrd, I was interested in participating in the ESIP session on the future of ACDD, but the conference registration fee is a barrier for me, and possibly for other individual users in a similar position. I therefore wanted to share some context here from the perspective of an active user of ACDD 1.3 metadata.

From a practical perspective, ACDD still fulfils its original purpose quite well: it provides lightweight, file-embedded discovery metadata that is easy to produce, portable, and useful even when datasets are exchanged outside of catalog or portal infrastructures. For many real-world NetCDF workflows, this baseline level of discovery metadata is still sufficient.

That said, I fully agree that ACDD would benefit from further development and clarification (e.g. improved machine-readability, clearer guidance on terms and requirements, and alignment with current practices such as persistent identifiers). However, I do not see a strong case for replacing ACDD with much heavier discovery standards in all contexts. In my view, incremental evolution is preferable to full replacement.

Importantly, I see ACDD as complementary to, not in competition with, external discovery schemas and catalog-level metadata. It can act as a lightweight, file-level layer that can be mapped to richer discovery records where needed. In this sense, it fits naturally with CF’s existing separation of concerns, including the description of file contents outlined in Section 2.6.2 of the CF conventions, without requiring CF itself to define or absorb discovery metadata.

[MathewBiddle]

@cofinoa, we might be able to help with the registration costs, if you are still interested in attending. Please send me an email (mathew.biddle@noaa.gov) and I'll see what we can do.

[cofinoa]

Thanks a lot @MathewBiddle, I really appreciate the offer. I have just sent you an email to follow up.

[cofinoa]

Hi @MathewBiddle, I will not be able to attend the ESIP session this time due to the registration requirements, but it would be very valuable for the CF community to hear about the conclusions and any next steps that come out of the discussion. Thanks for the support and for organizing this session.

[larsbarring]

Antonio @cofinoa: Well said! I fully agree!

In addition, as far a as I understand, the several of the ACDD core attributes are already well aligned with Dublin Core and/or the various OGC standards. Where possible, relevant, and feasible I think it would be advantageous to explore and strengthen these connections.

[ksauby]

Hi all, we had a great session at ESIP and would now like to continue the conversation, particularly including those that were unable to attend the session. I've started the conversation here: “The Future of ACDD” Next Steps and ESIP January 2026 Meeting Recap.

Specific question to discuss further include:

• Who wants to be involved and in what capacity? (I created a separate issue to address this question, so please feel free to post there.)
• What is our governance framework for this work on the ACDD? (I created a separate issue to address this question, so please feel free to post there.)
• Third, what important questions did I miss?

[ksauby]

Hi everyone, the ESIP Marine Data Cluster is hosting a meeting to review the January ESIP Meeting ACDD session and to discuss next steps. Please attend if you are able and interested!

Join us next Thursday (02/12) at 2 pm ET for the Marine Data Cluster Monthly Telecon!

MDC Meeting Connection Information:

https://www.esipfed.org/event/marine-data-13/

Please join us for this month's Marine Data Cluster call, where we'll review our session from the January ESIP Meeting

The Future of ACDD: Charting the Course Ahead
[session description here]

We will review outcomes and discuss next steps. Please forward to anyone who might be interested.

We hope to see you there!

• Marine Data Cluster