(no subject)

[usernamenumber]

Just learned that Seth Vidal, an important developer in the open source community, has died. It actually happened almost a week ago, but I've been out of touch and didn't hear about it until I happened upon a post by a former colleague at Red Hat, so I'm passing the sad news along to anyone else who might not know.

I'd only met the guy a couple of times, but he was one of those nerds who was brilliant and knew it. He didn't brag about it, he just was what he was, and that inspired respect. If you've ever used RHEL or Fedora, or any modern RPM-based distro, you've used Seth's work (he created yum, for those to whom that has meaning), so raise a glass to him. The community has lost a lot.

Also, Seth was killed by a driver who hit him from behind while he was on his bike and then fled the scene (still at large, afaik), so umm... you can also honor his memory by not being a horrible @#$@ing human.

Ok, breathing deep here, dealing with some feelings.

Comments

[spot.livejournal.com]

The guy who hit Seth turned himself into the police the next day. They charged him with vehicular manslaughter and driving with an expired license.

[usernamenumber.livejournal.com]

Well, that's... ugh, I can't even bring myself to use "good" to describe any part of this situation, but you know what I mean. Please pass my condolences and best wishes back to everyone in Westford (and Raleigh).