[s_severus]

As a teenager in the UK I bought an issue of a PC magazine that had a cover CD (remember?) with Borland C++ Builder. That's what got me started with programming.

A while later the same mag gave away a copy of Delphi. That really opened things up. I found it was more accessible and was quickly making all kinds of stupid windows forms apps and sharing them with friends.

So, no insight into what went wrong but the name Borland has very positive associations for me, and it's safe to say their products played a role in the course my life took.

[HeckFeck]

> A while later the same mag gave away a copy of Delphi.

Funny you mention that, was it PC Pro? I bought the same magazine a long time ago, I remember the CD. I really wanted to make windows appear and things happen on screen. But I unfortunately couldn't figure out the programming. It only came to me much later and long after Delphi (and winforms) had fallen.

[s_severus]

Either PC Pro or PC Plus! Hard to remember exactly all these year later. I wrote more about how it fit into my journey as a dev in this essay: https://www.michaelbromley.co.uk/blog/confessions-of-an-inte...

[CRConrad]

PC Plus, I'd guess. They had a long-standing series of columns by Huw Collingbourne on developing with it.

Another quirky memory of 1990s Brithish PC magazines: PC Shopper had a column by then-pharmacist-turned-computer-guy, now not wholly-unknown SF author Charlie Stross.

[HeckFeck]

Just finished giving it a read, thanks for sharing. Maybe some day I'll have done enough interesting things with programming to write a similar tale.