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I wrote: > OK, I'm convinced. We'll change the Best Practices description to use formulas for > signed types. Thanks again for the suggestion and for being persistent. Actually over lunch I decided there is another constraint we have to take into account: existing packed archives. For example, I don't think we can reduce the packed range by one and specify the minimum value should be used for the fill value. Instead I believe we have to map the whole range and respect whatever fill value is specified by the _FillValue attribute. I think the right way to do this is by only changing the formula for the packed data value, leaving the formulas for add_offset and scale_factor the same, but specifying: packed_value = nint((unpacked_value - add_offset) / scale_factor) - 2^(n-1) We also need to put a test or example code in the netCDF distribution that shows how to write packed data with a fill value and how to correctly read it. That way, we'll know we have the formulas right and developers can cut and paste from the examples. --Russ Russ Rew UCAR Unidata Program address@hidden http://www.unidata.ucar.edu Ticket Details =================== Ticket ID: VQZ-726653 Department: Support netCDF Priority: Normal Status: Closed