First and foremost, I would like to thank my wife, Ananya, for standing beside me throughout my career and writing this book. She has been my inspiration and motivation for continuing to improve my knowledge and move my career forward. During the writing of this book, I spent nearly every waking hour of my day either in the office or writing this book, including weekends. Whenever I felt low and lacked enthusiasm, she guided me through this phase; sometimes with me complaining and kicking. She had to bear with the grumpy me. She is my rock and I would like to dedicate this book to her.

I would like to thank my parents for giving me the freedom to choose my career path and always believing in me, and my elder brother, Ujjwal, for being my best friend.

Thank you Niladri Chakraborty for being there and supporting me. Without you, I wouldn't be where I am today.

Thank you Kalyan Guin and Suprovat Sinha for supporting me through thick and thin.

I must thank B S Nagarajan for supporting me throughout my career in VMware and helping whenever I required it. I hope that someday I can be more like you.

I want to specially thank Naresh Purohit for always believing in me and being the guiding star for me both professionally and personally.

Prashant Dwivedi, without you this book wouldn't have happened in the first place. Thank you for encouraging me so much.

I want to thank Alan Renouf for taking time out of his busy schedule, supporting me, and providing me with access to the required materials and information.

Thank you Brian Graf, Massimo Re Ferre, Dr. Tobias Weltner, and Jason Wasser for providing me with the material and support for this book.

I would like to thank my reviewers, especially Kyle Ruddy, Jason Gaudreau, Amit Agarwal, and Brian Wuchner, for not only reviewing the book but also for giving me suggestions to improve it as well. I would also like to thank Arun Nadar for following up with me and arranging everything for me.

Last but not least, thank you Packt Publishing for giving me the opportunity to write this book. I'd also like to thank every team member who contributed to this project, the external reviewers, and the other guys whom I didn't meet—your contributions were invaluable and this book wouldn't be what it is without you.