Alok Shrivastwa - Learning OpenStack

Alok Shrivastwa is a technologist from India, currently working as a director of Cloud Services for Microland Limited 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, 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 also authored several white papers 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 at @alok_as.

One of the best kept secrets about any form of art, including writing, is that it is through you and not by you! I would firstly like to thank God for giving me the knowledge, then the zeal, and finally, the opportunity to share it with everyone; secondly, my mother, Seema, without whose support and efforts I wouldn't have even dared to think about writing this book; thirdly, my father, Arun; and finally, my sisters, Kawshiki and Abhabya, without whom I would be so lost. I thank Microland for giving me the opportunities to work with every technology that I could have wished for.

I would like to thank the reviewers for their patient reviews and the excellent insights through all the drafts. which have not only helped me grow as an author, but also helped to shape the book. Thank you all! All the editors who have worked on the book have really worked their magic with it and no amount of thanks would suffice. Finally, I would like to thank Packt Publishers for providing the platform to connect with all enthusiastic minds, in the form of this book. I truly hope you enjoy it.

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 emerging technology practices 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 an expertise in creating new practices/service portfolios and in building and managing high performance teams, strategy definition, technology roadmaps, and 24/7 global remote infrastructure operations. He has varied experiences in handling diverse functions such as innovation/technology, service delivery, transition, presales/solutions, and automation.

He has authored white papers, blogs, and articles on various technology- and service-related areas. Also, he is a speaker at cloud-related events and reviews technical books. He has reviewed the books Learning Airwatch and Mastering VMware Horizon 6, Packt Publishing .

He holds various industry certifications in the areas of compute, storage, and security and also has an MBA degree 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 at @sunilsarat.

Firstly, I would like to thank the existence for enabling me to write this book. I would like to thank my familymy mother, Ratna, my wife, Abhaya, and my twins, Advika and Agnika, for supporting me throughout. Thanks to my friends KK, Syed, Samina, and Mayank for their encouragement.

I would like to thank Microland for all the exposure and support provided, which was instrumental for me to write this book. I am grateful to my coauthor, Alok Shrivastwa, and last but not least Packt Publishers for the opportunity and also for the guidance.

Dr. Ketan Maheshwari is a postdoctoral researcher in the Mathematics and Computer Science Division at Argonne National Laboratory. He earned his doctoral degree in 2011 from the University of Nice with the highest honors. His research interests include distributed and parallel computing with an emphasis on workflow programming of high-level science and engineering applications.

Dr. Maheshwari's recent paper on clouds, coauthored with colleagues and collaborators, has won the best paper award at the 2014 HPDC workshops. He has coauthored several papers in the area of HPC and distributed and cloud computing in international journals and conferences. He currently serves as an editor in Future Generation Computer Systems.

Ben Silverman has worn many hats in his careerUnix administrator, Engineer, Programmer, Consultant, IT manager, and Enterprise OpenStack Architect. Currently, Ben is currently a Cloud Architect at Mirantis where he works with product managers, project managers, engineering teams, customers, and sales teams to develop custom cloud solutions for customers based on the OpenStack platform and third-party partners.

Previously, Ben was the Lead OpenStack Architect and Engineer at American Express where he led the challenge of building and running American Express' first OpenStack private cloud. Previously, Ben was the Lead Technical Architect of a four-year, $1 billion data center migration project. During this engagement, Ben faced the challenge of designing strategies to move American Express' production datacenter from the West Coast to the East Coast.