First, I want to thank Packt for giving me the opportunity to write this book. I am grateful to my editors, Sarah Cullington, Swapna Verlekar, Joel Goveya, and everyone else from Packt. Without their encouragement, perseverance and excellent work, it would have been impossible to finish this book.

I also want to acknowledge the following colleagues over the years: Jim Quasius, Bill Nelson, Matt Heimer, Jessica Emmons, Elie Dagher, Peggy Harrington, Michael De Loia, Ron Pinkerton, Tom McGinn, Darren Smith, Jason Mitchell, Joey White, Reid Morrison, Murali Katapali, and Lloyd Fischer. I learned a tremendous amount from working with these excellent people.

Over my seven years of working as a Sun Certified Instructor for the best IT professional training organization, the Sun Learning Services. I was very fortunate to work with and learn from the most knowledgeable and passionate group of Java and Java Enterprise System training specialists. I want to thank every one of them.

Most importantly, I want to thank my family: my parents, Jiren and Hezhi for giving me the best education and teaching me the value of hardwork; my wife, Jianghua, for her unconditional love and support; and my son Jeffrey, for the all the joy he brings to us.