Known issues when using UPP with MPAS (MPASSIT) output

[jaymes-kenyon]

Regarding UPP use with MPASSIT-generated netCDF output, there are known issues:

1. The value for prec_acc_dt (precipitation-accumulation time interval, in minutes) is not being dynamically set in INITPOST_MPAS via the netCDF metadata. A human-readable value is present in the netCDF metadata (global attributes), but is either not correctly encoded (by MPASSIT) or not being correctly read (by UPP). Until a fix is developed, "prec_acc_dt" should be hard-coded for MPAS applications prior to compiling.

2. The value for iSF_SURFACE_PHYSICS (integer identifier for the land-surface scheme) is not being dynamically set in WRFPOST. Currently, MPASSIT netCDF metadata is incorrectly specifying SF_SURFACE_PHYSICS=0. Until a fix is deployed in MPASSIT, a hard-coded value (= 3) is in place.

3. The entries for the 1D SLLEVEL array (soil-layer depths) are not being dynamically set in INITPOST_MPAS via the netCDF "ZS" array. Until a fix is developed, "SLLEVEL" is hard coded for use with RUC LSM (i.e., SF_SURFACE_PHYSICS=3).

Copying @EricJames-NOAA and @SamuelTrahanNOAA for their awareness. This issue may be assigned to @jaymes-kenyon.