This icon is a plotting specification for imported text. It specifies the text box positioning in the plot frame of the Display Window / paper sheet. This is used to provide plot frames that can be filled with user defined text (e.g. to provide comments on complex plots).
The user text is provided by means of Text Plotting icons to be dropped in the plot frames containing this type of view.
This icon can also be used for layout purposes, e.g. if no Text Plotting icons are dropped then an empty box will be created in the Display Window / paper sheet.
In fact, the Annotation View combines three Metview 3 Views: TextView, EmptyView and ImportView (to be implemented).
The macro language equivalent is .annotationview()
The Bufr Picker Editor
Data
Drop any icon containing or returning BUFR data. This may be, for example, a MARS Retrieval (of observations) icon, a BUFR file icon or an Observation Filter icon (provided it outputs BUFR, not geopoints).
Output
Specifies the output format you want. Specify one of the geopoints formats (Geographical Points, Geographical Polar Vectors or Geographical X Y Vectors).
Parameter
To specify a parameter enter its unique BUFR descriptor value (a numerical code). Geographical Polar Vectors and Geographical X Y Vectors require two descriptors, separated by a slash (/). The descriptor value is of the form XXYYY, where XX defines the class (e.g. 12 = Temperature class) and YYY the parameter within that class (e.g. 12004 = Dry bulb Temperature at 2m). These descriptor values are different from the ones of the GRIB format. If you do not know the descriptor value, click-left on the assist button to obtain a check list of parameters and associated descriptors. This list only contains the most common parameters. If the one you need is not on the list you can use the BUFR Examiner (right-click, Examine the BUFR file) to see what is there, or up its descriptor value in the "BUFR Reference Manual" (available from http://www.ecmwf.int/products/data/software/bufr.html#description) - see "BUFR Table B", pages 6-19. The significance of code and flag values for non-quantitative parameters are given in the same manual, in "BUFR code table", pages 22-70.
Missing Data
If set to Ignore, missing data is not included in the output file; this is the default behaviour. If set to Include, missing data will be output to the geopoints file, its value being set to that specified by Missing Data Value. Note that when the output format is one of the two geopoints vector formats, the observation is considered missing if one or both of the parameters are missing.