Kids, don’t try this at home. Writing a book takes personal sacrifice, including many hours staring at your monitor while just knowing that nobody will actually read this, except your relatives. And even then it becomes obvious that they’ll nod their heads with a vacuous look on their faces and say, “Clustering what? Does that include Nougat in some fashion?”

With that off my chest, many people stood beside me and helped me a great deal while I wrote this book.

I must thank Brad Stone for tricking me into calling my bluff about writing a book. I also want to thank Ed Winters, one of those guys who gives endlessly; Ben Cottrell, for introducing me to the joys of UNIX; and Dave Prado, for believing in me enough to give me my first chance. I’d also like to thank Joel Baker of Mnemosyne Consulting for his invaluable advice regarding high-availability clustering.

To my wife, Chriss, for being there for me through thick and thin, and for being my best friend for 11 years.

Finally, I would like to thank my friends who have stood by me and knew I could do this, even when I didn’t.