Dinesh Priyankara  is an experienced professional and database enthusiast with skills in database management systems and business intelligence, especially on the Microsoft SQL Server product suite. Possessing over 16 years of experience on data related technologies, he does training, consulting, and is a top contributor to the local SQL Server community. In recognition of his contributions and expertise he has demonstrated, he was awarded the Microsoft Most Valuable Professional (MVP) award for SQL Server for 11 consecutive years since 2006.

Dinesh is the Founder/Principal Architect of dinesQL (Pvt) Ltd (http://dinesql.com), a company that provides services on database, business intelligence, and training. In his spare time, he runs a blog at http://dinesql.blogspot.com  with a follower base of over 100,000 from around the world and is a co-organizer of SQL Server Sri Lanka User Group (http://www.meetup.com/ssslug/).

Even though he has written many articles on the database area, this is his first official book as a co-author.

I would like to especially thank my daughter, Minupama Dulnethmi, who always encouraged me to complete my book with her fullest support. And I would also like to thank all of my family members and friends who helped on this in many ways.

My sincere appreciation to the entire team at Packt Publishing, with special thanks to Amrita Noronha and Vinay Argekar.

Robert C. Cain (http://arcanecode.com) is a Microsoft MVP, MCTS Certified in BI, and is the owner of Arcane Training and Consulting, LLC. He is also a course author for Pluralsight, with over 11 courses to his credit. Robert is a team mate at Linchpin People, and co-author of four books.

A popular speaker, Robert has presented at events such as the SQL PASS Summit, IT/Dev Connections, TechEd, CodeStock, and numerous SQL Saturdays. Robert has over 25 years’ experience in the IT industry, working in a variety of fields including manufacturing, insurance, telecommunications and nuclear power.

I would like to thank my wife and daughters for their patience as I worked on this book. I also wish to thank my coauthor, Dinesh. Without his help, this book would not have been possible. My editor, Amrita, needs special thanks; this book would not be what it is without her patience and guidance.

I would also like to thank two long-time mentors. The first is Adam Curry. From his humble beginnings as a radio personality and MTV VJ, Adam became a pioneer in the early days of the Internet. In addition, his implementation of the podcasting platform opened a wealth of knowledge to both myself and many others.

I would also be remiss not to acknowledge John C. Dvorak. From his early columns in PC Magazine to his various TV shows and podcasts, John provided a wealth of information that guided my career.

Finally, I would like to thank the pair of them for their work on The No Agenda Show ( http://noagendashow.com ). I spent many late nights working on the demos for this volume listening to their entertaining and informative podcast.