I was born in Dhahran in 1986, left in 2002. My dad worked in Aramco’s drilling department and was not insignificantly involved in introducing PCs to the organization. From his telling it was mostly for selfish motivations to improve inventory, logistics, and accounting workflows to be more manageable for his own teams. He was getting the Aramco library signed up for computer magazines before I was born. He has some interesting stories about the early days of computing, from inside the bowels of this company.<p>I learned to build PCs from parts I purchased from Philippino merchants at al Shula mall in the mentioned Khobar. I attended LAN parties on the initially mentioned street in the article in Dhahran proper, Prairie View. I taught myself to program on a TI-83 calculator at Dhahran school.<p>I transitioned into the tech industry pretty quickly out of college after studying poli-sci related curriculum w focus on Middle East, and have worked in O&G related tech for a good part of my career. I’m a product manager for an O&G portfolio product now. I have friends working in Aramco still, many Aramco friends in the town I live, and family in the region in similar arrangements. Happy to answer questions regarding any of the above.<p>There are quite a few resources available for those curious about the country, company, and history of expatriate workers in the region. “The Prize” mentioned in another few comments is an excellent primer, a lesser know resource I’ve come to like are “Out In The Blue”, by Tom Barger who retired from Aramco as CEO in 69. The book is a collection of letters from himself and other expatriate workers to their families about the establishment of exploration activity in the country. It’s got a bit of “the party line”, rosy-towards-the-Saudis feel but is some excellent and generally unknown primary documentation of the company’s early years. Another book less charitable to Saudi, American, or even my own role in the country’s history is “Cities of Salt” by Abdelrahman Munif. That was a multi part fiction giving a semi-historical recounting of the establishment of a Dhahran-like town in a Saudi-like country from the perspectives of different local people living there already. It is phenomenally authentic, and has a spirit of understanding of the sentiment there that is not common. The work has been banned in kingdom.