Acknowledgments

Many people helped make this book possible, some of them in big ways and others in critical, yet nearly invisible ways. We'd like to acknowledge them here.

Yanek Korff

First and foremost, I'd like to thank my wife, whose patience continues to surprise me. This book would never have been possible without her help and her support. Also, although she's not old enough to harbor a grudge or appreciate gratefulness, I'd like to thank my one-year-old daughter. She's only ever known a workaholic father and doesn't realize she should be jealous.

An obvious thank you to my parents for putting me on the road to geekdom back in early 90s, and of course putting me through college. May my educators forgive me for everything I've forgotten.

I'd also like to thank Viren Shah who introduced me to FreeBSD. I wouldn't be where I am today without the support and mentoring he's provided me over the years.

Finally, thanks to my good friend Matt Rowley, owner of much computer junk. Some of that junk and the advice that came with it were integral to this book's creation.

Paco Hope

I'd like to thank my wife, Rebecca, who administered everything that doesn't run FreeBSD (like children, houses, and pets) while I was building Frankenstein's BSD lab in our basement. I am grateful for my time in the Department of Computer Science at the University of Virginia, where I cut my teeth as a system administrator. I thank the folks at Cigital, Inc. for introducing me to risk-based approaches to software and system security. Lastly, I thank Adrian Filipi, who gave me my first BSD/386 floppies back in 1993.

Bruce Potter

I would like to thank my wife for being incredibly understanding throughout the writing of this book and the million other things I had going on in the last year. She was amazing, even when I was not. I'd like to thank my kids, Terran and Bobby, and "Uncle Andy" for giving me time to write. Also, I would like to thank all the members of The Shmoo Group for helping me become the geek I am today. Without their friendship and expertise, I don't know where my career would be today (full of moose, no doubt). The same goes to my folks who supported me through my fits and starts in college. And finally, a specific thanks to Joel Sadler, who gave me my first FreeBSD disk in 1995 telling me, "Here, try this. It's better than Linux."

Our Reviewers

We appreciate all the feedback we received from our technical reviewers. They definitely kept us on our toes and made this book better by lending their expert advice and opinions. Thanks to Flávio Marcelo Amaral, Ren Bitonio, Mark Delany, Adrian Filipi, Eric Jackson, Jose Nazario, Neil Neely, Wayne Pascoe, Viren Shah, and Shi-Min Yeh.

O'Reilly

Finally, we thank the staff at O'Reilly, especially Tatiana Diaz, Nathan Torkington, Allison Randal, David Chu, Andrew Savikas, and the innumerable others who have made this book a reality without our knowledge of their existence. An extra thank you goes to Tatiana for helping us reboot this effort after it locked up in the middle of 2004.