Curious, I feel your pain. However I am not a bit surprised after all this time there is no system for proper data documentation and full disclosure of collection, analysis and ‘adjustments’ methods as part of overall record keeping. We’re dealing with a global hodge podge of academics over several climate science disciplines with almost no training in quality measures. Bates recognizes this problem and, though he does not explicitly state it in the presentation, he understands the lack of good record keeping standardized methods and procedures eats away at the credibility of the science as a whole. I think Bates speaks your language.
I am not sure how he assigned the ‘maturity’ levels to the different areas of concern, but none are ‘mature’. The documentation, metadata and validation areas are all at the ‘provisional’ level of maturity. Climate science is a fledgling endeavor compared to other scientific disciplines and we, you and I and other engineering/scientist types, who operate in a world of accountability need to press those pushing agendas for the full monty. When someone within that community recognizes one of the problems we see as obvious, then we need to encourage that behavior.