The Public Software is an initiative from Brazil’s government to provide free software as a public service to the society. It is a portal for communities of free softwares developed by the government and the private sector. All of the solutions are used in production sites inside of the major public institutions of Brazil and in the private sector.

In February 2009, at Havana, Cuba, was launched the project to internationalize the Free Software Portal, an initiative to help other countries to implement free software in their government adopting the Brazilian model. Cuba was the first one to join it, and they will choose one of the free softwares in the portal to be translated to Spanish and used in different sectors of the Cuban society.

After that other governments has shown desire to join the project such like Paraguay, Trinidad e Tobago, Ecuador, Bolivia and Colombia. Now Brazil started to visit countries around Latin America to present the Public Software Portal. Uruguay was the first one to be visited, the goal with these meetings is to present the experience of the Public Software in Brazil.

The internationalization process is an attempt to share the solutions with other countries and also to involve them on the development of those free softwares communities. The process will involve the translation of the solutions as well as the creation of a special portal translated to other languages which will host communities of free softwares from other countries.

The First Public Software Meeting will happen this year on Octuber during the Latinoware Conference at Foz do Iguaçu, Paraná. It will be historic and will greatly enhance the process of adoption of free software by Latin America governments.