Acknowledgments

First I’d like to thank Lyndall, my beautiful wife, for being supportive and giving me the time I needed to write this book. It took much longer than we originally thought, but her enthusiasm was unwavering, despite the many weekends that I spent cloistered in the study.

Second, I’d like to thank the team at Manning: my editor, Sebastian Stirling, for his suggestions and experience; June Eding and Tiffany Taylor for the final editing, proofreading, and push across the line; Karen Tegt-meyer for organizing the whole thing; and Michael Stephens for helping me develop the initial concept of the book.

Third, I’d like to acknowledge J.D. “Illiad” Fraser of User Friendly for letting Manning use the User Friendly cartoons in the Hello! Series and allowing me to put my own words in the characters’ mouths in this book.

Next, I’d like to thank all of my beta testers who helped find errors— Daniel Hadson, Eldar Marcussen, William Taylor, David Hepworth, and Tony Haig—as well as everyone in the MEAP program who offered advice and criticism or discovered errors.

Finally, I would like to thank the following peer reviewers who provided invaluable feedback on the manuscript at various stages of its development: Tray Skates, Curtis Miller, Joe Hoover, Michael R. Bain, Francesco Goggi, Mike Stok, Michael R. Head, Cheryl M. Davis, Daniel Bretoi, Amos Bannister, Rob Allen, Dr. John Grayson, William Z. Taylor, Munch Paulson, David Hepworth, Eldar Marcussen, Daniel Hadson, Tony Niemann, Paolo Corti, Edmon Begoli, Lester Lobo, Robby O’Connor, and Sopan Shewale. And special thanks to Marion Newlevant for her careful technical review of the final manuscript during production and to Steve Holden for agreeing to write the foreword to my book.