GIS and CAD

I posted earlier today about my steps into the realm of 3D CAD. I am also playing with GIS, or Geographic Information System. Essentially that means it is a system that manages geographically related data. If data relates to geography in some way, GIS can be used to display it.

GIS can be used in many fields, so many. Architects, Civil Engineers, Planners, Police, Airlines, Hospitlas, Software Developers, Real esate Sales, Government, Election Workers, Politcal Parties, Miliary, Sales Departments, Health Department, and many many more.

GIS and CAD are two completely different tools. They are used differently, they work differently, and they have different porposes. With CAD, users create the data to make a drawing. With GIS, users turn on the data they want to see to create a drawing. However, there are exceptions to these rules in bot cases of course. Sometimes in CAD, users refernce other drawings (thus turning on the data they want to see) and in GIS they enter the data they want to use.

In CAD, users display geometric data, and in GIS users display geographic data. There are similarities too of course.

Which GIS program have (or do) you used? I have used Mapinfo, Map3D (from Autodesk) and Arcinfo. None of them full time and I am not an expert on any of them. How about you?