During the many years that the FreeBSD Project has been in existence, sadly, some of our developers have passed away. Here are some remembrances.
In rough reverse chronological order of their passing:
John Birrell <jb@FreeBSD.org> (1997 - 2009; RIP
2009)
John made major contributions to FreeBSD, the best known of which is the import of the dtrace(1) code. John's unique sense of humor and plain-spokenness either ruffled feathers or made him quick friends. At the end of his life, he had moved to a rural area and was attempting to live with as minimal impact to the planet as possible, while at the same time still working in the high-tech area.
Jean-Marc Zucconi <jmz@FreeBSD.org> (1994 - 2009;
RIP 2009)
Jean-Marc was an astrophysicist who made important contributions to the modeling of the atmospheres of both planets and comets at l'Observatoire de Besançon in Besançon, France. While there, he participated in the conception and construction of the Vega tricanal spectrometer that studied Halley's Comet. He had also been a long-time contributor to FreeBSD.
Jun-ichiro Itoh <itojun@FreeBSD.org> (1997 - 2001;
RIP 2008)
Known to everyone as itojun, Jun-ichiro Hagino was was a core researcher at the KAME Project, which aimed to provide IPv6 and IPsec technology in freely redistributable form. Much of this code was incorporated into FreeBSD. Without his efforts, the state of IPv6 on the Internet would be much different.
Cameron Grant <cg@FreeBSD.org> (1999 - 2005; RIP
2005)
Cameron was a unique individual who contributed to the project despite serious physical disabilities. He was responsible for a complete rewrite of our sound system during the late 1990s. Many of those who corresponded with him had no idea of his limited mobility, due to his cheerful spirit and willingness to help others.
Alan Eldridge <alane@FreeBSD.org> (2002 - 2003; RIP
2003)
Alan was a major contributor to the KDE on FreeBSD group. In addition, he maintained many other difficult and time-consuming ports such as autoconf, CUPS, and python. Alan's path was not an easy one but his passion for FreeBSD, and dedication to programming excellence, won him many friends.