About the Author

Vivek Thakur is passionate about architecting and developing applications based on the Microsoft .NET platform using ASP.NET, C#, VB.NET, and MS AJAX. He has authored several technical articles on ASP.NET and has also been an All-Star-level contributor on the ASP.NET forums. Vivek's passion for ASP.NET has been formally recognized by way of the Most Valuable Professional (MVP) award given to him by Microsoft in April 2007, and again in 2008. He is also a Subject Matter Expert for Microsoft ASP.NET 3.5 Certification Exams. He is a leading contributor and moderator in the CodeAsp.Net forums. Vivek is currently working as the Managing Partner in Axero Solutions LLC, a US-based software product development and business consulting firm.

Although his expertise lies in Microsoft's .NET platform, Vivek is also knowledgeable on J2EE and C/C++. He has a deep interest in programming, chaos theory, and artificial intelligence, and is a strong advocate of chaos theory in software systems and management.

Besides his love for software architecture and design, Vivek also focuses on project management skills and has substantial experience in managing small to medium sized projects. He has also conducted numerous training sessions and provided concept-based tutoring for different software firms across India.

Vivek received his Bachelors degree in engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), New Delhi, India.

Writing this book would not have been possible without the support of my family and friends. My sincere gratitude to my mother Sharda Thakur, father G.C Thakur, and my sisters Isha and Shikha Thakur for their continued support and encouragement while I was writing this book. Special thanks to my friend Kritika Srinivasan for her incessant support throughout.

I would like to acknowledge Tim Eisenhauer for his extended support while technically reviewing the book, and also for his extended efforts in discussing and providing feedback on many topics.

I would like to thank Ian Robinson and Jerry Spohn for their relentless efforts in technical reviews and making sure that I do not miss out on core technical issues. Thanks to Ved for his detailed feedback and help in solving basic queries.

Also, many thanks to our technical editors Rakesh and Shadab, and our Production Coordinator Shantanu.