Remembering Bob Lee • Hacker News Board

Re: Remembering Bob Lee

#231

Post by springrod » Sat, Apr 08, 2023, 4:08 AM UTC

tomandrews88 wrote: post #56

hobr wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I met him around the same time and we did the conference circuit together for a fair few years. I vividly remember being sucked into his craziness more than a few times in my formative years! A fun, welcoming guy and an incredible technologist.

> being sucked into his craziness Just curious what was he like in terms of the craziness? Partying? Skydiving?

Certainly partying. But also unpredictable (good unpredictable) and creative in unexpected ways. Good crazy.

Re: Remembering Bob Lee

#232

Post by springrod » Sat, Apr 08, 2023, 4:21 AM UTC

dalmaer wrote: post #225

I first met Bob on TheServerSide.com, which I ran for a few years. We would debate all things Java, at a time where that was the place to pioneer in a lot of ways. For real. When I met him in person I was confused. He looked too cool for school. He carried himself in a certain way. He wouldn’t want to talk to me… But no. He was an ultimate geek too. I saw him in many situations where he fit in there too. It always fe…

Yeah those TSS days were awesome. Quite a special moment. Lots of smart people doing interesting stuff (and partying) but Bob was particularly creative, and always brought a unique take to any problem.

So sorry I missed the wedding. I think I was speaking or doing a client call at the time.

Re: Remembering Bob Lee

#233

Post by andora » Sun, Apr 09, 2023, 1:48 AM UTC

RIP Bob Lee

Re: Remembering Bob Lee

#234

Post by cpurdy » Sun, Apr 09, 2023, 3:24 AM UTC

springrod wrote: post #229

As the creator of Spring, it might surprise folk to know that Bob and I were good friends, and that I had immense respect for Bob's brilliant mind and instinct for API design. We first met 20 years ago, in 2003. It was the same evening I met Cameron Purdy and Juergen Hoeller, at the first ServerSide Symposium, in Boston. Bob must have been 23. He looked like a kid, although he’d already achieved a lot. Actually, he a…

That TSS in Boston was an amazing confluence of people, mostly all unknown at the time! There was: You, Gavin, Bob, Mike Cannon-Brookes, Marc Fleury, Neelan Choski, Patrick Linskey, and at least a dozen other notables, all who went on to have outsized impact on our industry.

Re: Remembering Bob Lee

#235

Post by hani13 » Sun, Apr 09, 2023, 8:51 AM UTC

I don't know when I met Bob. It was just as he was joining Google, and like many others, we met at conferences and instantly hit it off (for entirely unclear reasons). He liked the BileBlog, and delighted in how immature and childish it was, with all the poo flinging and whatnot. He'd always egg me on to go further, say worse things, poke more fun at everyone.

Whenever we met up, Bob would drag me kick and screaming out of my comfort zone. Somehow, everything I did with Bob always seemed like a bad idea but always turned out to be memorable and wickedly fun. He was so enthusiastic for life, and his enthusiasm was infectious.

I remember talking to him when he got the Square CTO offer, and him giggling about how uniquely unqualified he felt but hey why not, he's crazybob so no matter what happens he'll have fun. He took me on a tour of the NYC office, and was bemused by how silly it was that he was supposed to be the adult in the room.

Somehow amidst all the fun, we still managed to find time to discuss all things Java, from the politics of the JCP to why Guice refused to support @PostConstruct to the clever hackery he figured out to get Guice to have useful error messages when bindings failed.

I'll miss you Bob, you were a bright beacon of joy that inspired everyone around you.