FW: Obituary for Janis Jagars (Disastry)

[Toxik - Fabian Rodriguez]

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May his soul rest in peace.

I never got to know him personally but noticed his work, which was
also part of the latest WinPT installer.

Fabi=E1n Rodr=EDguez - Toxik Technologies, Inc.
www.toxik.com - (514) 528-6945 @221
OpenPGP: 0x5AF2A4D5

> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-ietf-openpgp@mail.imc.org
> [mailto:owner-ietf-openpgp@mail.imc.org]On Behalf Of Len Sassaman
> Sent: Thursday, February 13, 2003 3:36 PM
> To: ietf-openpgp@imc.org
> Subject: Obituary for Janis Jagars (Disastry)
>
>
>
> Janis Jagars, known to many people on the Internet by his handle
Disastry,
> was a prolific programmer who made numerous valuable contributions
to the
> Internet. I am afraid I cannot do his memory justice, having known
him
> only a short number of years and only through his work on privacy
> enhancing programs, but he earned my respect and appreciation for
his
> achievements in that area.
>
> I first "met" Janis Jagars while I was employed by PGP Security.
In
> preparation for the release of PGP 7, I located and contacted the
people
> responsible for other implementations of OpenPGP, in order to set
up
> interop testing. Janis was working on updating the DOS-aware PGP
2.6.3i
> program to work with modern implementations of PGP. His work on
that
> program, and his presence in the IETF OpenPGP working group, helped
to
> smooth over a number of PGP compatibility problems. On the PGP
newsgroups
> and mailing lists, Janis helped many new PGP users get started
using email
> encryption, and tirelessly answered support questions for
privacy-related
> programs. To my knowledge, Janis operated the only anonymous
remailer to
> exist in Latvia.
>
> Janis was, by the original definition, a true Cypherpunk. He
believed that
> privacy was a right that must not be denied to Internet users, and
he
> wrote code to help ensure that it could not be.
>
> When he needed a way to easily send encrypted email through
Netscape, he
> wrote a plugin. When he wanted a way to mount PGPdisk volumes under
Linux,
> he wrote a conversion tool. When Windows users wanted a
pre-compiled
> version GnuPG, Janis gave them one. Janis understood that the fight
for
> Internet privacy must take place at the hands of programmers, and
he rose
> to the challenge of bring useful privacy-enhancing programs into
> existence, and into the hands of the public.
>
> Immediately after the terrorist attacks in September, 2001, I took
over
> maintenance of the Mixmaster anonymous remailer project. Mixmaster
had
> been unmaintained for over a year, and needed serious work. I was
> delighted when I received email from Janis, offering his help. Over
the
> next year, entirely of his own initiative, Janis ported Mixmaster's
server
> functionality to Windows, brought Mixmaster's OpenPGP support from
an
> unstable "alpha" state to a solid, usable feature set, and
established
> himself as an invaluable member of the Mixmaster development team.
The
> upcoming Mixmaster 3.0 release features a number of crucial
improvements
> which would not have happened had it not been for Janis's
involvement.
>
> My last communication with Janis was on October 11th of last year.
He had
> planned a vacation in Nepal, and expected to return a month later.
When he
> did not return, we feared the worst. Sadly, it turns out that our
fears
> were true: On October 31, while descending from Lobuche summit,
Janis fell
> 250m, and did not survive.
>
> I am dedicating this year's CodeCon conference to Janis's memory.
Janis
> will be missed, but his contributions will still be appreciated
and
> utilized. It is my hope that Janis's work will serve as an example
for
> other like-minded programmers, who chose to give their time and
code in
> the name of free speech and privacy.
>
>
> Len Sassaman
> 13 February 2003
> San Francisco, CA
>
>
> --
>
> Janis's home page may be viewed here:
> http://web.archive.org/web/20010927055328/disastry.dhs.org/
> News of his accident can be found here:
>
http://www.vertikalex.lv/minisurvey/Discussion/ShowMessage.asp?ID=
=3D4703
>
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