Simplify signature of xr.open_dataset using new decoding_kwargs dict

[TomNicholas]

What is your issue?

The signature of xr.open_dataset is quite complicated, but many of the kwargs are really just immediately passed on to the public xr.decode_cf function internally. Specifically mask_and_scale, decode_times, decode_timedelta, use_cftime, concat_characters, decode_coords, and drop_variables are all passed on. Whether or not xr.decode_cf is used at all is controlled by the decode_cf kwarg, which is currently a boolean.

We could instead group all of these kwargs into a single decoding_kwargs dictionary keyword argument. We could also replace the decode_cf kwarg with a general decode or decode_func kwarg, with a type something like Callable[Dataset | AbstractDataStore, Dataset], which by default would point to the xr.decode_cf function.

This would:

• Greatly simplify the signature of xr.open_dataset,
• More clearly separate concerns (opening data and decoding are separate steps),
• Allow users to define their own decoding functions, even with existing backends (e.g. a netCDF file that follows non-CF conventions, such as can be found in plasma physics),
• Follow the same pattern we already use in open_dataset for from_array_kwargs and backend_kwargs,
• Avoid this old issue Can we clarify decode_cf option of open_dataset? #3020 (because once the deprecation cycle was complete you wouldn't be able to pass a specific decoding kwarg whilst also specifying that no decoding is to happen).

The downside of this is that there would be a fairly significant blast radius of warnings raised during the deprecation cycle.

[dcherian]

Cam we close in favor of #4490?

[TomNicholas]

Cam we close in favor of #4490?

Oops 🤦‍♂️ I'll add anything not already mentioned there then close this.

[TomNicholas]

Closing as a duplicate, see #4490 (comment).