About the documentation, I agree with Max. Read the Concepts book, scan
Objects, then do the Tutorial. Eventually you'll want to skim over all of the
books, to become familiar with them and the system.
As for your development environment, I like to use Borland's editor in
Windows 95, have a Dos window for compiling, and another Dos window for
running Swat. This way I can see all the windows at once. I also run Acrobat
Reader for reading the documentation on the CD. Very nice for searching and
copying stuff into the source code. I prefer Windows 95 over 3.1. It's more
stable and easier to customize.
Oh, and upgrade as soon as you can. A 286 target machine is a painful
experience.
Nathan