Feature request: export ref_azimuth and ref_elev with ATL03

[jonm3D]

These two fields from ATL03 can be used to calculate the underwater return refraction correction, and are vital for conducting ICESat-2 bathymetry research. Having the ability to pull these with the atl03sp() would be fantastic!

[jpswinski]

@jonm3D thanks for letting us know! We would love to be able to support bathymetry research, and will try to get this into the next release. The main difficultly will be in figuring out a way to include these parameters on request while still leaving them out when they are not needed. This is something we need to solve for other parameters as well, so it is something we need to solve sooner than later. I'll track the progress in this issue.

[jpswinski]

@jonm3D It's been a while, but we finally have this feature in the code. SlideRule is nearing completion of a major architectural upgrade. The ability to add ancillary fields is in the new version of SlideRule, which can be found at https://slideruleearth.io. The old service at http://icesat2sliderule.org is still up and functional (and we will be leaving it up and running for a while until everyone switches over), but it doesn't have any of the new features.

To start using the latest version of SlideRule:

• Update your client to the latest version (v1.5.5 as of right now) - you can either upgrade your existing client via conda or checkout the sliderule-python repo and do a conda env create -f environment.yml to create a new environment with the latest client.
• Change your Python code to point to slideruleearth.io:

  icesat2.init("slideruleearth.io")

To include the ref_azimuth and ref_elev fields in your results, please see a tutorial I put together that details exactly how to do it: https://slideruleearth.io/rtd/tutorials/user/ancillary_fields.html

[jpswinski]

@jonm3D I am closing this out as complete - but if you have any issues, please reopen this issue or open a new one.