Informization is a trend of the modern social development. Informized products have played a more and moreimportant role in the knowledge\|economic days. Digital cartography based on GIS is a typical representative. The digital cartography transforms a map into a spatial database with the aid of the function of GIS\`s spatial analysis to produce various derived maps based on the techniques of GIS, e.g. spatial inquiring, searching,picking up and composing of data. All of these are not only improve the flexibility of maps, but also provide a possibility to show real\|time spatial information of a map. In this paper, the authors simply introduce the characteristics of digital cartography andits operating process and discuss the development of the digital cartography for the future. As a kind of new industry, the digital cartography would play a more and more important role in the course of the national sustainabledevelopment.