The Servico Federal de Processamento de Dados (SERPRO), (a US$ 1 billion annual revenue Brazilian government owned IT enterprise), announced during the Debian Day Brasil 2008 Porto Alegre that it has selected Debian GNU/Linux as the preferred distribution for its hundreds of GNU/Linux development and production servers. Future SERPRO tenders and public hearings will include clauses requiring Debian GNU/Linux compatibility. Recent SERPRO tenders have already encouraged participation by small FLOSS regional companies, as well as Debian support services.
The SERPRO board decided that Debian GNU/Linux is more suitable for its new corporate goals. SERPRO has decided to increase supplier independence, flexibility, agility, and participation in technical solutions by direct interaction with the Debian Project community. This is the first time that a federal government institution of this size has reached out to the Debian Project community for a closer relationship. The Debian Project will keep its institutional partners collaboration channel available for other government agencies who want to consider a similar relationship.
During a discussion panel with the LUG Debian RS (mediated by the Associacao Software Livre at Debian Day Porto Alegre) SERPRO heard suggestions on how to encourage the participation of key employees, avoid internal forks of FLOSS projects, and modify its internal culture to relax tight project controls. These will increase collaboration with, and gain the respect of, the community for mutual benefit, improving communications, and so lead to better operational performance.
SERPRO has created a FLOSS Strategic Coordinator (CESOL), in part to assist co-operation between FLOSS communities and other federal government agencies, using the federal government committee for FLOSS implantation (CISL) website and meetings. SERPRO and other Brazilian government agencies have already started to release some code as free software.
SERPRO is evolving its internal culture to the values of FLOSS through the creation of a corporate internal Wiki, Gforge, introducing regional FLOSS committees, increasing management awareness at all levels, opening code, and supporting FLOSS events. Debian Day Brasil 2008 was supported by SERPRO and a number of other companies.
About SERPRO
The Servico Federal de Processamento de Dados (SERPRO) is a US$ 1 billion annual revenue Brazilian government owned IT enterprise for other government agencies.
It has 43 years experience of development and production, 10,000+ employees, and manages a nationwide network infrastructure of tens of thousands machines, from handhelds to mainframes, clusters and grids, at or for many Brazilian government agencies.
About the Debian Project
Debian GNU/Linux is one of the free libre operating systems, with a broad list of officially maintained packages on 15 hardware platforms, from cell phones to mainframes, developed by more than two thousand volunteers from all over the world who collaborate on the Debian Project.
The Debian Project's key strengths are its volunteer base, its dedication to Free Libre Open Source Software, to the Debian Social Contract and the non-profit nature Debian Constitution, its open and meritocratic development model, its organization and social governance and its commitment to provide the best operating systems attainable, following a strict quality policy, working with an established QA Team and helpful users reporting bugs, suggestions, exchanging ideas, solutions, and registering experiences during its history.
One can help Debian Project joining it or even not being a programmer, or being a development and or service partner company or institution at the Debian Partner Program, or simply making various donations to the Debian Project.
Debian Project news, press releases and press coverage can be found from the official Debian wiki page. PR contact at debian-publicity list.
