Few company names hold as much appeal for hard-core programmers as Borland. But now, Borland—the name— is no more. Early in 1998, Borland changed its name to Inprise, but it's clear that the company is still Borland and a cadre of loyal programmers continues to tout the virtues of its development tools. There was a time when Borland's fortunes rested on its Pascal product. Later, when C and C++ gained popularity, Borland had a well-respected offering there, as well. Eventually Microsoft (for reasons not germane to this discussion) pretty much took over the C++ market, leaving Borland with a throng of die-hard Pascal programmers. In an attempt to revitalize Pascal, Borland introduced Delphi—an extremely visual environment that won critical acclaim for its technology. However, even after Borland put a new C++ back end on Delphi (creating CodeBuilder), too many programmers were entrenched in Microsoft C++ and wouldn't or couldn't switch horses in midstream.
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