2 What is GIS?

GIS stands for either Geographic Information System or Geographic Information Science, depending on what aspect of the term we are interested in.

Geographic Information System typically refers to the software, like QGIS, we use to create spatial data and to investigate spatial relationships between that data.

Geographic Information Science is the framework we use to ask questions about the spatial relationship between data.

It’s good to understand the difference, but you’ll rarely hear people distinguish between the two. We’ll do both today - work with the software and ask questions about the spatial relationships in our chosen datasets.