Well, since you've started it, Steve.... I was born in New Zealand and emigrated to Australia in the late '70s. I started with computers with a Timex/Sinclair and then a TI until IBM compatibles came along. (Dear Mr. Texas Instruments. Please rebuild my computer. I'm claiming it as a warranty job due to your misrepresentation. I took it apart but there were a lot more than eight bits inside....) Was always intrigued by graphics and first learned to create virtual 3D shapes with POVray. Assembling a scene by command line, limited preview, then having to reduce the colour depth to look at a preview-like result afterward because VGA is 8-bit graphics was frustrating. Then found a shareware CAD program called ProtoCAD and learned a lot with it. Then a number of other CAD programs that were all trying to be AutoCAD, and used AutoCAD at work, from R8 or 9, I think. Started using TurboCAD around version 3, which was 2D only, but TurboCAD grew up and changed completely for the better. Started looking at CU when V2 was new, but too expensive for me back then, so thanks Punch! and Tim for ViaCAD. Not delirious about the interface, but like some tools that aren't available elsewhere. Between VC and TC, lots of bang for the buck. Both apps do things the other doesn't, but ACIS transfer is seamless. My boss encouraged me to go get some qualifications, so, two years distilled, what I actually learned was how to layout and print hard copy with AutoCAD and adherence to standards for those sheets, but they gave me certification for other stuff I already knew. I bought a CAM version of TurboCAD and learned some CNC coding with that, but haven't used that industrially, only to run homemade routers and small mills. Have used CAD for commercial/industrial design, consumer product design, patent illustration, user guide/manual illustration and layout, reverse engineering and scale modelling. CAD's something of a passion to me, as well as a work tool, and it's been the one skill I have that's been used in every place I've worked.

Murray (pls excuse typographical diahorrhea. Computer-taught touch typing too)