With today being Thanksgiving day here in the United States, I thought it appropriate to mention a few of the people who have influenced this project over the course of the last year.

First of all, I feel very blessed to have the parents that I do. My mother and father have spared no expense, both in terms of time, money, and love, in giving me every possible opportunity and encouragement.  My mom in particular has sacrificed much over the years to make sure that I never did without. I owe my passion for computer programming to my dad, who initiated it all by giving me a copy of Learn Basic Now! when I was in fourth grade. I couldn’t wish for better parents.

I’m also quite indebted to my fiancée, Jocelyn Felt.  It is no exaggeration to mention that I’ve never felt happier at any time in my life than I have since we met last May. Not only that, but she edited countless drafts of the thesis proposal and listens to me go on and on about it all without complaint. We’ll be getting married this December, an event I look forward to with eager anticipation! Basically, I love her a lot.

Dr. Embley has been an excellent advisor. I remember one comment in particular that he made in late September. I was dragging on writing the thesis proposal at the time because of work, classes, and other interests. I came to meet with him that day empty-handed and he said, referring to the tendency for grad students that are working full-time jobs to take forever, “Well, I thought you were going to be an exception to the rule, but I guess not.” Ouch! He knew just which button to push. Needless to say, he had a completed first draft the next day.

Shaun Carlson, my second cousin, was the one who introduced me to Personal Ancestral File, the impetus for this entire project. Believe it or not, I didn’t know the first thing about genealogy when this all began.

Faith Shuss, an old friend and excellent writer who reviewed and edited countless pre-drafts when this project first began. I can’t wait to read her work when she starts publishing.

My good friend, Ethan Garofolo, who recently moved to Texas for his new job at National Instruments, reviewed pre-drafts of the thesis proposal and gave invaluable input. He keeps me up-to-date on all the great .NET stuff that I’m missing out on in Java-land.

Dr. Knutson, who wrote a recommendation that helped me get into the Master’s program and served as my first advisor. His Software System Design and Implementation class was my favorite undergraduate course.

The dear friend of my teenage years, Blake Householder. It was our pleasure to spend hours engaged in discussion and debate, of topics both related to our lives and not. Favorite themes included mathematics, puzzles, computer programming, and strategy games. He was undoubtedly the more intelligent of the two of us and continually pushed me to be and achieve more. He produced in me the passion to excel.

Incidentally, you can thank Blake for the nucleartoiletpaper.com domain name. He came up with it for me a long time ago when I was trying to figure out a name for a BBS I was setting up. The BBS is long dead but the Website lives on.

[Hilton is currently on vacation; this message was pre-recorded.]

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