The first PDF I had was a 'bonus' book that came on a CD included with a programming book. There was a compiler along with sample code from the book, and then s

The first PDF I had was a 'bonus' book that came on a CD included with a programming book. There was a compiler along with sample code from the book, and then something like SAMS Teach Yourself Visual C++ in 21 Days. I absolutely hated it. My screen was only 640x480, so I could barely see a whole page, much less see my IDE at the same time. These were the days of single 14 or 15 inch monitors, not dual or triple 24" widescreens. It was also a little on the slow side. Early Pentium, 8MB RAM, 4X CD-ROM... These days I'm delighted to see a PDF. There's a table of contents and index, they're searchable...copy and paste usually stinks, though. PDF's are forever. They print nicely. They don't get lost when the project upgrades a major version, you can still use them when there's a DNS issue with your ISP, you can use them when you don't have internet...