Technologist and Open Source champion Atul Chitnis is dead

June 03, 2013 15:08

Atul Chitnis, one of the best known Indian-origin technologists and an advocate of open source software, died this morning of cancer. He was 51 years old.

Chitnis was the founder of FOSS.in, one of the largest conferences on free and open software.

After being diagnosed with intestinal cancer in August 2012, he recently blogged about it thus: "Ever since I got diagnosed with cancer in August 2012, I have been acutely aware of the fact that professionally, things were going to change dramatically for me. While I intend to beat this thing, I also need to consider that a lot of things will change for me -- things that I can do things that I won't be able to.'

The German-born consulting technologist is described on his Twitter page thus: 'Irrationally committed product guy, FOSS.IN founder, former PCQuest columnist, writer, RadioVeRVe, amateur musician & cook, beating stage 4 cancer.'

His last tweet was yesterday: 'Morning prayer: Pink Floyd's Shine on You Crazy Diamond :) Complete with my cousin's cat in Berlin'.

RIP Atul Chitnis.

« Back to LIVE

TOP STORIES

Bibhav Kumar sent to 5-day police custody in Maliwal assault case

It noted the prosecution's submissions about the need to take Kumar to Mumbai and other parts of the national capital to collect evidence, which was not possible without the accused's custody.

AAP workers marching towards BJP HQ detained, Sec 144 imposed

The traffic police also issued an advisory in view of the protest planned outside the BJP office at the Deen Dayal Upadhyay Marg, while entry and exit have been disallowed at the nearest ITO metro station.

Factors that will guide the markets this week

The last batch of quarterly earnings, global trends and trading activity of foreign investors will guide the equity market movement in a holiday-shortened week ahead, analysts said. Volatility may continue amid investors' cautious...

'God's plan, baby': Yash Dayal redeems himself

Yash Dayal had the haunting memory of Rinku Singh's five consecutive sixes last year when Mahendra Singh Dhoni lofted his full-toss over the Chinnaswamy stadium roof in Saturday's crucial IPL match in Bengaluru.

Golden Girl Sobhita

After choosing the royal colour, Sobhita Dhulipala turned it up a notch higher and went for gold for her second appearance at the Cannes Film Festival.