SP100– to test or not to test—

Pat Kinney has noted that some of the statements I made in the open letter I sent to SP100 were factually not correct. I take him at his word and must apologise for not being as precise a fact checker as I should be. I can only say that I am a technologist, first, and a journalist later.
However, Pat’s notes do not compel me to renounce my argument: we need to report out a single protocol with a single physical layer. The only logical way I can see forward from the impass that SP100 has found itself in is to either determine which of the competing proposals is better, or determine that a compromise proposal better suits the end user community. The only way to do that is the way prescribed for 500 years by the scientific method: test, test, test. The end user community will not stand for another fieldbus fiasco.