The Gospel according to Pat Kinney...

...and believe me, I'm Pat's chief disciple.  Here's the text of an email Pat just sent to the SP100 committee. It mirrors in many ways my editorial in the forthcoming May issue of Control and I can't say enough how much I agree with Pat on this, and how much I strongly encourage other SP100 members and others with vested interest in WirelessHART and Zigbee and SP100 to conform to what Pat is asking: I would like to thank everybody involved in ISA SP100.11a for all their hard wor...
April 27, 2007
2 min read
...and believe me, I'm Pat's chief disciple.  Here's the text of an email Pat just sent to the SP100 committee. It mirrors in many ways my editorial in the forthcoming May issue of Control and I can't say enough how much I agree with Pat on this, and how much I strongly encourage other SP100 members and others with vested interest in WirelessHART and Zigbee and SP100 to conform to what Pat is asking: I would like to thank everybody involved in ISA SP100.11a for all their hard work. Now that we are making significant progress we will have to field questions from others outside our group regarding how SP100.11a fits with other existing and emerging wireless initiatives. Since we're all very closely tied to SP100 efforts, it's natural that we have a bias towards "our" standard versus any other initiative. It's come to my attention that in some recent email, conversations, and conference calls that some disparaging comments were made about Wireless HART and ZigBee. This is very inappropriate and we must refrain from doing it.There are some clear distinctions between SP100, Wireless HART and ZigBee. We need not claim that one standard is better than any other, that's an end user decision. But they are different and it's important that we agree on the core differences.Here's a short list of differentiators from Wireless HART:1) SP100.11a supports multiple protocols via single wireless Infrastructure including HART, Profi, Mod, FF, etc. 2) SP100.11a supports performance levels that enable some factory automation applications, not just process3) SP100.11a is developed by an open user-influenced standards bodyOur differentiation from ZigBee includes SP100 being industrial strength with: 1) Reliability (enhanced error detection, frequency hopping)2) Predictability (TDMA, Quality of Service levels)3) Enhanced Security (designed towards FIPS 140-2 level 2)I believe that this differentiation speaks for itself and doesn't require us to remark negatively about alliances such as Wireless HART or ZigBee. Again, in the end, the market will decide which standards/specifications are viable and those that aren't.To conclude, I am asking that all SP100 members:--Not make any disparaging remarks against Wireless HART or ZigBee--Be positive and pro-active about SP100--Remember the old adage: if you can't say something good about somebody, don't say anythingSincerely,PatPatrick Kinney Kinney Consulting LLC IEEE: WG vice Chair, TG chair ISA: SP100.11a & Coexist. WG chair ZigBee: Officer, WG chair +1.847.960.3715 [email protected]

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waltboyes

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