About the Authors

Alok Shrivastwa is a technologist from India, currently working as the director of cloud services for Microland Ltd. in their Center of Innovation. He has a keen interest in all things physical and metaphysical and is an innovator at heart. He has worked with multiple large- and medium-sized enterprises, designing and implementing their network security solutions, automation solutions, databases, VoIP environments, datacenter designs, public and private clouds, and integrations.

He has also created several tools and intellectual properties in the field of operationalization of emerging technologies. He has authored a book, Learning OpenStack, with Packt Publishing, and has authored several whitepapers and blogs on technology and metaphysical topics, in addition to writing poems in Hindi. Also, he has been a guest speaker for undergraduate engineering students in Chennai.

You can connect with him at https://in.linkedin.com/in/alokas or follow him on Twitter at @alok_as.

We are like the fire at the end of the matchstick, we appear when we are needed, and once our work here is completed, we disappear into the same nothingness we all came from. I thank that nothingness we all fondly call God. I thank my mother, Seema, for making me who I am today; my lovely sisters, Kawshiki and Abhabya; my beautiful wife, Priyanka, for tolerating the insanity; and my father for supporting me throughout.

I thank the reviewers who were patient in reviewing the work and shaped the flow of the book. I thank all the editors at Packt for being extremely helpful and understanding and finally Packt Publishing for allowing me to share whatever little I know.

Sunil Sarat is the vice president of cloud and mobility services at Microland Ltd., an India-based global hybrid IT infrastructure services provider.

He played a key role in setting up and running the emerging technologies practice, dealing with areas such as public/private cloud (AWS and Azure, VMware vCloud Suite, Microsoft, and OpenStack), hybrid IT (VMware vRealize automation/orchestration, Chef, and Puppet), enterprise mobility (Citrix Xenmobile and VMware Airwatch), VDI /app virtualization (VMware Horizon Suite, Citrix XenDesktop/XenApp, Microsoft RDS, and AppV), and associated transformation services.

He is a technologist and a business leader with expertise in creating new practices and service portfolios, building and managing high-performance teams, strategy definition, technological roadmaps, and 24/7 global remote infrastructure operations. He has varied experience in handling perse functions such as innovation/technology, service delivery, transition, presales/solutions, and automation.

He has authored whitepapers, blogs, and articles on various technologies and service-related areas, is a speaker at cloud-related events, and reviews technical books. He has authored Learning OpenStack and reviewed Learning AirWatch and Mastering VMware Horizon 6, all by Packt Publishing.

He holds various industry certifications in the areas of compute, storage, and security and holds an MBA in marketing.

Besides technology and business, he is passionate about filmmaking and is a part-time filmmaker as well.

For more information, you can visit his LinkedIn profile at https://www.linkedin.com/in/sunilsarat or follow him on Twitter at @sunilsarat.

Firstly, I would like to thank the Existence for enabling me to write this book. I would like to thank my family—my mother, Ratna; wife, Abhaya; and my twins, Advika and Agnika—for supporting me throughout. Thanks to my friends Karthieyan K., Syed, Samina, and Mayank for their encouragement.

I thank Microland for all the exposure and support provided, which was instrumental for me to write this book. My gratitude to my co-author Alok Shrivastwa and, last but not least, to Packt Publishing for the opportunity and guidance.