Atul Chitnis

Atul Chitnis
Born(1962-02-20)20 February 1962
Berlin, Germany
Died3 June 2013(2013-06-03) (aged 51)
NationalityGerman
CitizenshipIndian
Occupation(s)Consulting, writer, Public Speaker
Known forFOSS.IN
SpouseShubha
ChildrenGeetanjali
Websiteatulchitnis.net

Atul Chitnis (20 February 1962 – 3 June 2013) was an Indo-German consulting technologist. He was one of the organizers of FOSS.IN[1] (formerly Linux Bangalore), which was one of Asia's free and open source software (FOSS) conferences.

Career

In 1989, Chitnis set up a Bulletin Board System (BBS) called CiX[2] which provided an entry point for many users to online communities.[3][4] He was the author of a PCQuest magazine column – COMversations.[citation needed] Chitnis gave talks on data communication in Indian industry, the Internet and intranets.[citation needed] As a Consulting Editor for PCQuest,[5] he worked on the PCQuest Linux Initiative.

Working as a volunteer in the FOSS community such as the Bangalore Linux User Group, and through seminars and articles, he encouraged use of FOSS technologies. Chitnis was one of the organizers of the Linux Bangalore series of FOSS community driven conferences. FOSS.IN is said to have been one of Asia's largest annual FOSS events.[6][7] Atul also served as one of the members of the faculty committee at the National Resource Centre For Free/Open Source Software.[8] He often spoke at various fora on FOSS technology and adoption. [citation needed]

Death

Atul Chitnis was diagnosed with intestinal cancer in August 2012.[9] He died on 3 June 2013.[10][11][12]

References

  1. ^ Venugopal, Vasudha (24 October 2010). "More Join the Chorus for Free Software". Chennai: The Hindu.
  2. ^ The BBS Documentary Library
  3. ^ Rediff Guide to the Net: Features: The Way We Were
  4. ^ The Future of Media? Archived 2 February 2009 at the Wayback Machine
  5. ^ "Remembering Atul Chitnis". PCQuest. 3 June 2013. Archived from the original on 19 June 2013.
  6. ^ "Monsters and Critics". Archived from the original on 6 November 2007. Retrieved 10 October 2007.
  7. ^ "CIOL: Free world event FOSS.IN/2005 opens in Bangalore". Archived from the original on 2 February 2009. Retrieved 10 October 2007.
  8. ^ "NRCFOSS Faculty Committee Meeting". Archived from the original on 4 August 2007. Retrieved 30 April 2006.
  9. ^ Pandey, Akansha (3 June 2013). "Atul Chitnis's death moves people". DNA.
  10. ^ "R.I.P Atul Chitnis : The Man Who Changed the Open Source World". NextBigWhat.
  11. ^ "Shine on, You Crazy Diamond: Atul Chitnis (1962–2013)". NDTV. 3 June 2013.
  12. ^ "Open Source guru Atul Chitnis, 51, no more". [CIOL]. 3 June 2013.
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