site description in VIEW about lter-core-metabase HOT 6 CLOSED

from lter-core-metabase.

SiteName is required, so there should always be at least the site name in geographicdescription. Therefore, I think the view should have something like an if-else statement that says,

If SiteDesc isn't null, then use SiteName: SiteDesc; otherwise, use SiteName.

from lter-core-metabase.

Not if/else. Use coalesce. There are complex situations that do warrant if/else but this is not one of them. The coalesce() function is built for this purpose.

from lter-core-metabase.

So then, how about this:

COALESCE(s."SiteName" || ': ' || s."SiteDesc", s."SiteName") AS geographicdescription;

from lter-core-metabase.

--or
s."SiteName" || coalesce(': '||s."SiteDesc",'');
-- if that is the output you want, SBC style. For MCR, I'll go with the following
coalesce(s."SiteDesc",s."SiteName");
-- since in my instance my SiteNames are redundant to the first bit of the description. That is, all my descriptions begin with something like 'LTER 1 is...' so putting 'LTER 1: LTER 1 is...' is bad. YMMV.

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In the official repo, will you please put one or the other or your suggested solutions? Either one is better than what is currently there. We can explain how those fields are used in the documentation.

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