Mailing the story:

CAD—Computer aided design, or computer aided drafting, depending on who you ask—is technology created to make it easier to create specifications for real-world objects. Whether the object you're building is a house, car, bridge, or spaceship, chances are it got its start in a CAD program of one type or another. Among the best-known CAD programs is AutoDesk's AutoCAD, but there are many others out there, both proprietary and open source alike. So how do the open source alternatives to AutoCAD stack up? The answer depends on how you plan to be using them. read more