I am grateful to the many people who have helped with this text. My sincere thanks go to the following technical consultants:
• Danny Bosch and Matthew Peralta for sharing their expertise with optical networks and unshielded twisted-pair cabling, and Don Yates for his help with the initial Net-Challenge Software.
• Abel Sanchez, for his review of the Linux Networking chapter.
I also want to thank my many past and present students for their help with this book:
• David Potts, Jonathan Trejo, and Nate Murillo for their work on the Net-Challenge Software. Josiah Jones, Raul Marquez Jr., Brandon Wise, and Chris Lascano for their help with the Wireshark material. Also, thanks to Wayne Randall and Iantha Finley Malbon for the chapter reviews.
Your efforts are greatly appreciated.
I appreciate the excellent feedback of the following reviewers: Phillip Davis, DelMar College, TX; Thomas D. Edwards, Carteret Community College, NC; William Hessmiller, Editors & Training Associates; Bill Liu, DeVry University, CA; and Timothy Staley, DeVry University, TX.
My thanks to the people at Pearson for making this project possible: Dave Dusthimer, for providing me with the opportunity to work on this book, and Vanessa Evans, for helping make this process enjoyable. Thanks to Brett Bartow, Christopher Cleveland, and all the people at Pearson, and to the many technical editors for their help with editing the manuscript.
Special thanks to our families for their continued support and patience.
—Jeffrey S. Beasley and Piyasat Nilkaew