ITWire

iTWire recently spent a very pleasant hour with Jon Callas, currently CTO of Entrust.  In the past, Callas had worked twice at Apple, principally as an operating system security expert.  Here is part of that discussion.

iTWire: Jon Callas, firstly, do you have any thoughts to share on the passing of Steve Jobs?

Callas: It was a shock, but no surprise.  I expected him to continue to be working until they dragged him off to hospice.  The fact that he survived a week after resigning made me think, 'oh hey, he must be doing better than I thought; I hope he's off enjoying himself.' 

So, he had pancreatic cancer, and most people who have pancreatic cancer live for less than six months and he happened to have the rare type that doesn't kill you in less than six months and so he had seven good years.

He was an extremely creative guy, a real hard-ass, he was simultaneously a real jerk and a really nice guy all at the same time and that was one of the things that made him the hardest to deal with, knowing which one of them you were going to end up with.

iTWire: ...and Jobs was a madman behind the wheel, so we hear.