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Alexandre Oliva's Home Page

Cropped version of the picture taken for the Free Software Foundation by the LibrePlanet 2017 official photographer (what's her name?), when I was given the award for the Advancement of Free Software. CC BY 4.0 © FSF. FSF, 40 years GNU, 40 years Freedo, the Linux-libre logo Welcome to my home page!

As of June, 2005, I've joined the efforts to create FSF Latin America. I'm FSFLA's board member, and I maintain my blog there: Blonging for Freedom. In 2019, I also joined the board of directors of the original FSF; that did not last long, but I got another shot.

At LibrePlanet 2017, I received the FSF Award for the Advancement of Free Software. In August 2018, I joined the FSF board of directors and became a voting member. In January, 2021, I resigned from the board, but I was elected back in June, 2025, and confirmed as board member in September, 2025.

Follow me in the Fediverse, the freedom-respecting social network, on snac.

I'm also lxo in GNU Jami, and I have a Tox ID.

I've been a GNU Toolchain Engineer at AdaCore since June, 2018.

I was also a GNU Toolchain Engineer at Red Hat from February, 2000 to June, 2019. I worked on porting toolchains to various embedded microprocessors, and more recently on optimizations and debugging information for optimized programs, an interface for GDB to compile code snippets with G++ to extend a running program, and a full code review of GNU libc in order to document various safety properties. My last major project was gOlogy: a study of the impact of nearly all of GCC's optimization passes on debug information quality.

In 1998, I got a MSc degree in Computer Sciences at the Distributed Systems Laboratory at the Institute of Computing of the State University of Campinas (UNICAMP). I used to research Software Engineering, Computational Reflection (read about it in the Guaraná Home Page) and Distributed Systems.

The "ytdl://" URI scheme I use to link to third-party videos stored in a hostile proprietary video hosting platform enables one to download the videos with such programs as youtube-dl and ytdlp, to stream them directly onto such programs as vlc and mpv, and to watch them in web browsers without running proprietary web blobs at various Invidious web sites.

On Sept 28, 2025, I first presented "Handling C++ Exception Hierarchies in Ada" (slides) at the GNU Tools Cauldron.

On Sept 27, 2025, I first presented "Time-traveling through the GCC PR database and testsuite" (slides) at the GNU Tools Cauldron.

On Sept 1, 2025, I was interviewed by Cristiano Furtado for his show "Bate Papo Nerd". Here's an audio recording. The video is available elsewhere.

An Angry Pile of Poo

On May 5, 2024, I first presented "Software Enshittification or Freedom -- It's not a hard choice!" at LibrePlanet 2024 (LibrePlanet video, slides, planscript).

On Aug 16, 2025, I first presented it in Portuguese (slides, video), as part of Debian Day Campinas. It was also presented at Festa do Software Livre on Oct 3, 2025. It will next be presented during IME-USP's Computing Week, on Oct 22, 2025.

On Aug 14, 2023, I first presented "Free Software: Freedom, Autonomy, and Sovereignty", in Spanish (recording, slides, planscript, audio and transcript), to the Central American Parliament (full webinar recording).

On Nov 1, 2023, I first presented it in Portuguese (slides), for Semcomp SSA 2023.

On Nov 12, 2024, it was presented in Portuguese at 10o Cinfotec Unicamp (recording).

It will next be presented in Portuguese at Festa do Software Livre on Oct 5, 2025

On Sept 27, 2022, I first presented "The Free Software Movement and the GNU Project" (in Portuguese) at University of Campinas. It was an informal conversation, and unfortunately the recording didn't work.

On Sept 16, 2022, at the GNU Tools Cauldron, I'm presenting "New and upcoming Hardening Features in GCC" (slides).

On Jan 21, 2021, I launched diag2021, a diagnosis program that takes a description of symptoms, and recommends actions that may alleviate the problem. It's a reaction to an app published by Jair Bolsonaro's Ministry of Health, that recommends medicines already shown to have no positive effects in treating or preventing COVID-19, and often even fatal effects. My "corrected" version only recommends the impeachment of president Bolsonaro. That may not have been scientifically proven to solve the problem, but it's very unlikely to have any detrimental side effects.

A blackhole that nothing can escape from

I launched my new project, 0G, with the speech "Escaping the Surveillance Blackhole with Free Mobile Computing" (slides, slightly modified; recording, DebConf's recording and slides), at DebConf 19, on July 23, 2019.

An updated presentation was streamed on Oct 13, 2020, for the NUUG Oslo's monthly meeting (video).

The pt_BR launch took place on Aug 3, 2019 at [GNU/]Linux Developer Conference Brazil, with translated slides (video).

On Sep 8, 2018, at the GNU Tools Cauldron in Manchester, UK, in a session entitled A collection of debug info improvements for the GNU Compiler Collection, I first presented "gOlogy: impact of -O* on -g" (slides), the highlights of a study of the effects on debugging of the various passes enabled by -O flags in GCC.

Big Bad Wolf, Spectre and Meltdown breaking in

On Jul 13, 2018, I first presented "Who's afraid of Spectre & Meltdown" in Portuguese (slides, video) at FISL18.

An article with the same title was published after updates reflecting NetSpectre.

It was presented on Aug 16, 2018, at USP EACH, with updates reflecting NetSpectre and ForeShadow (slides, audio).

It was first presented in English (slides, video), at [GNU/]Linux Dev Conf BR, on Aug 25, 2018, and then at LibrePlanet 2019 on Mar 24, 2019 (LibrePlanet video, updated slides) and at DebConf 19 (recording), on July 20, 2019.

The Post-Truth Santa Claus and the Concealed Present

On Mar 26, 2017, I first presented The Post-Truth Santa Claus and the Concealed Present (slides, video) at LibrePlanet 2017.

It was also presented, in Portuguese, at FLISoL Araraquara (video), on April 8, 2017, at the Free Software Lectures series at University of Campinas on April 12, 2017 (audio recording), at SECOMP Unicamp on August 1st, 2017, on September 28, 2017, at FTSL, in Curitiba, on July 11, 2018, at FISL18, and on Sept 28, 2018, in the series of computing lectures of the Institute of Computing at Unicamp.

On Sept 14, 2016, I presented at Encripta Tudo Unicamp a first draft of a speech about freedom-respecting cryptography software and decentralized communication tools to resist corporatocracy, government surveillance and the upcoming dictatorships. No title, no slides, no recording yet, but stay tuned.

On Oct 29, 2016, I presented "HaL e SoL, ou HAL 9000", in Portuguese, (slides, video) at e-HaL. I presented it again on Jul 12, 2018 (video) at FISL18.

The Singularity, The Matrix and the Terminator

On Mar 20, 2016, I presented The Singularity, The Matrix and The Terminator (video) at Libreplanet 2016.

On Jul 14, 2016, I presented it at FISL 17, for the first time in Portuguese. It was presented again on Sept 17, 2016, at Software Freedom Day Campinas 2016, on Oct 21, 2016, at OpenCon Campinas (first time with slides in Portuguese), on September 27, 2017, at FTSL, in Curitiba, and on April 28, 2018 (audio), at FLISoL Araraquara.

See also Free Software and the Matrix below.

At FISL 16, I first presented "Exorcism of Proprietary BIOSes" in Portuguese (slides, video), about Libreboot, a Free BIOS implementation.

It was also presented, combined with the one about Restricted Boot, at Focus on Technology at Unicamp Limeira 2015.

Unfortunately, after those presentations, the main author and maintainer of Libreboot quit the GNU Project and started shipping proprietary blobs, defeating the purpose of a libre project, and betraying users misled by the project's name. (I refer to such jerk moves as "pulling a Linux", because that was done to the kernel Linux in 1996, motivating Linux-libre.)

Fortunately, GNU Boot came to the rescue, as a successor to the GNU Libreboot project. See also this other speech and this article.

Also at FISL 16, Anahuac de Paula Gil and I presented "O Tux não nos representa!" (meaning "Tux doesn't stand for us!") in Portuguese (slides, video).

1984+30: Big Brother is *P*atching You

On Mar 23, 2014, I first presented 1984+30: GNU speech to defeat e-newspeak at LibrePlanet 2014, also presented at FISL 15; at Software Freedom Day Campinas 2014; at SECOMP UFSCar 2014; at Focus on Technology at Unicamp Limeira 2014; on Mar 18, 2015 at UFABC São Bernardo; at EXPOTEC 2015 in João Pessoa.

At FISL 14, I first presented "GNU: 30 years fighting for user-obedient software" (in Portuguese). It was later at the Technology Forum at Unicamp Limeira; at Latinoware 2013; at Computing Week at UFSCar 2013; and at the Engineering and IT Week at Policamp 2013; at SECOMP Unicamp 2014; on Mar 9, 2015, to the Unicamp Computing freshmen; on Mar 18, 2015 at UFABC Santo André; at FLISOL Campinas 2015; on Aug 24, 2016 at the Free Software lectures at IC-Unicamp.

Restricted Boots

I spoke about Restricted Boot: the False and the True Solutions (in Portuguese) at FISL 14 and Latinoware 2013.

At FISL 14, Thadeu Cascardo and I spoke about "Hacking Banks and the IRS", in which we discussed the proprietary tools Brazilians must use to comply with their tax obligations, how we're fighting that with IRPF-Livre and rnetclient, and how we'd like to automate netbanking operations and how banks get in the way. There's a recording of the session available from the FISL web site.

On Apr 9, 2013, I first presented "Save the Hackers!" (in Portuguese), at 3o SENID. It was presented again on FLISoL Campinas on Apr 27, 2013, and to the students of "Computing and Society" at University of Campinas on May 20, 2013.

It was first in Spanish on November 30, 2015, at the Central University in Quito, Ecuador, as part of the 6th Free Software Itinerant Congress.

Red Hat Brasil invited me to speak at Red Hat Day BM&F Bovespa on Dec 9, 2011, presenting (in Portuguese) the speech Software Livre e Inovação.

An updated, revamped and shortened version was presented under the title "Por que Software Livre?" (Why Free Software?, or Why Open Source?, depending on your bias) to Red Hat Brazil Global Customer Convergence attendants on May 9, 2013.

Power porn, injected drugs and software box

On July 23, 2010, at FISL 11, I first presented "Sexo, Drogas e Software: Filosofando nas Trincheiras entre o Bem e o Mal" ("Sex, Drugs and Software: Philosophy in the Trenches between Good and Evil). The audio of the speech was recorded by Adriana Bunn. A shorter version was recorded the next day at Radio Software Livre. Another presentation on August 19, 2010, at Universidade de Brasília, was recorded in video. On January 22, 2011, at Campus Party Brasil 2011, it was also captured in video, and so was it on May 29, 2012, at Espírito Livre magazine's 2nd forum (video). On April 16, 2011, it was first presented in Spanish at FLISoL Bogotá.

Terror regime after gold

On July 21, 2010, at FISL 11, I first presented "Demonizando Monopólios Intelectuais: Ao Povo o que é do Povo" ("Demonizing Intelectual Monopolies: Returning to the People what Belongs to the People). It was also presented on Sept 29, 2010, at the Free Software Lectures series at University of Campinas, and on Oct 18, 2010, at UFBA in Salvador, at Ética Hacker e o desenvolvimento científico e tecnológico (Hackers' Ethics and the scientific and technological development). On January 22, 2011, at Campus Party Brasil 2011, it was also captured in video.

On Saturday, March 21, 2009, I first presented Linux-libre and the prisoners' dilemma at Libre Planet 2009, in Boston, Massachusetts, USA.

It was also presented on April 8, 2009, in Campinas, SP, as part of the Free Software Lectures series at University of Campinas, combined with Copying and Sharing in Self Defense and a summary of the Libre Planet 2009 conference. A Spanish version was recorded for FLISOL 2009, listen to this and other recorded speeches here The first live presentation in Spanish took place at the FLISOL 2009 Tour (in Spanish) in Panamá City, Panamá, on April 23, 2009. It was later presented on September 17, 2009, at COSECOL in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic; on October, 30, 2009, at Jornadas de Software Libre (pictures) en Cúcuta, Colombia; on August 7, 2015 at ECSL 2015 in San Pedro Sula, Honduras, and on December 2nd, 2015, at the Central University in Quito, Ecuador, as part of the 6th Free Software Itinerant Congress.

It was first presented with slides in Portuguese at FISL 10, on June 27, 2009, and then on September 25, 2009, in the week-long Software Freedom Day celebration at IME-USP, on October 7, 2009, at ICMC-USP São Carlos; on November 11, 2009, at CESoL-CE 2009; on April 26, 2010, at FLISOL Campinas 2010, on May 19, 2010, at the Free Software Lectures series at University of Campinas, and on August 23, 2017, again at the Free Software Lectures at IC-Unicamp (here's an audio recording).

A fishy computer user

On June 25, 2009, at FISL 10, I first presented "A Isca, o Anzol e a Grande Rede", describing visually the tactics that fishers use to capture software users with bait, hooks and the broad net. It's based on an article with the same title. It was also presented on September 2, 2009, at the Free Software Lectures series of the University of Campinas, on October 20, 2009, at 1st Free Software Forum in Duque de Caxias (pictures), on October 24, 2009, at LATINOWARE (pictures), on November 13, 2009, at CESoL-CE 2009, on April 26, 2010, at FLISOL Campinas 2010, on May 7, 2010, at IV ENSOL, and on August 20, 2010, at CONSEGI 2010 (audio); on Feb 3, 2015 at SERPRO São Paulo for CISL (the Brazilian government's Free Software Adoption Committee).

It was also presented in Spanish on September 17, 2009, at COSECOL in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, and on December 2nd, 2015, at the Technology Institute Ramón Barba Naranjo in Quito, Ecuador, as part of the 6th Free Software Itinerant Congress.

On Monday, January 19, 2009, FSFLA published my paper Copying and Sharing in Self Defense, written for publication in the proceedings of the first CESoL-CE, where the ideas were first brought up in a debate about the authoriterrorism bill in Brazil.

It was first presented as a full speech at Campus Party Brasil 2009, on January 22, 2009, with subtitle "Society versus Industry of the United States of Pãnic", alluding to a "novella" entitled "Union of the States of Pãnic" that intersperses another article, yet to appear as a chapter about licensing in a book to be published by Comunidade Sol.

It was also presented at EPICENTRO 1, on March 19, 2009 in São Paulo (recording, in Portuguese), at the lightning activism sessions at Libre Planet 2009, on March 22, 2009, in Boston, Massachusetts, USA (there are English slides, but they could not be used there); on April 8, 2009, in Campinas, SP, as part of the Free Software Lectures series at University of Campinas, on October 16, 2009 and August 8, 2011, at Policamp, on November 12, 2009, at CESoL-CE 2009, on April 26, 2010, at FLISOL Campinas 2010, on May 9, 2010, at IV ENSOL, on Sept 24, 2010, at 13a Semana da Computação at ICMC-USP São Carlos, on September 12, 2016, to students at COTIL.

A Spanish version was recorded for FLISOL 2009, listen to this and other recorded speeches here. It was also presented on April 23, 2009, in Santiago, Veraguas province, Panamá, as part of the FLISOL 2009 Tour, as a keynote speech at FLISOL Panamá 2009, on April 25, 2009, with live transmission from Panamá City to several other FLISOL sites in Panamá and campi of the ULACIT network in other countries, on September 15, 2009, as a keynote speech at COSECOL in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic; on August 7, 2015 at ECSL 2015 in San Pedro Sula, Honduras; and on December 2nd, 2015, at the Catholic University of Ecuador, in Quito, as part of the 6th Free Software Itinerant Congress. FSFLA Anti-DRM Logo, by Alfredo Daniel Rezinovsky, CC BY-SA 2.5 Argentina

On the week May 23-31, it was presented at the virtual conference 7o SENAED, as part of a blog on Copyright and Plagiarism. The presentation/transcript (in Portuguese) starts here. This speech was also presented at at FISL 10, on June 27, 2009.

On Tuesday, June 17, 2008, I presented "A Plan to Fix Local Variable Debug Information in GCC" at the GCC Summit 2008. The slides and examples are available. This work was also presented on August, 23, 2008, at CESoL-CE, and on Nov 4, 2009, at the Free Software Lectures series of the University of Campinas.

A continuation of this work, "Consistent Views at Recommended Breakpoints", was presented at the GCC Summit 2010, on October 27, 2010. Paper and slides are available.

An updated version was presented at the GNU Tools Cauldron 2017, in Prague, Czech Republic.

First presented on Friday, April 18, 2008, the anti-non-Free Software speech compares the harmful social and individual effects of tobacco (tabaco) and tobraco (trabaco). One of them is well known for causing dependency and impotence, having a powerful and unscrupulous industry promoting products while perfectly aware of the harmful consequences they bring to their customers; in fact, these businesses take advantage of the dependency and even enhance it to increase their gains. The other is just a plant from whose leaves cigarettes et al are made.

The picture mocks with a Brazilian cigarette brand curiously named Free, to denounce the tactics used to confuse customers of both tobacco and tobraco and misguide them to harm.

Slides are available in Portuguese, English, and Spanish.

This speech was also presented, in combination with "FSFLA's Coolest Works (2008)" on May 16, 2008, at the 1st Free Software Symposium of Santa Bárbara D'Oeste and surroundings at Faculdades Anhanguera, on June 24, 2008, at a meeting about Agile Methodologies for Development with Free Software at University of Campinas, on August, 22, 2008, at CESoL-CE, on August, 29, 2008, at CONSEGI, on September 17, 2008, at Semana de Atividades Integradas do CEATEC da PUC Campinas, on September 18, 2008, at Software Freedom Day in Santo André, SP, on October 20, 2008, at Universidade Anhanguera, Indaiatuba-SP, on October 23, 2008, at Universidade Católica, Pelotas-RS, and on November, 26, 2008, at EMSL'08 in Belo Horizonte, MG, and on April 7, 2009, at the University of Campinas, as part of the series of lectures organized by prof Claudia Bauzer.

The apology to software users was formally added to the end of this speech. This combined set of slides was presented on Nov 19, 2010, at Free Software Day: Public Administration in Ilha Solteira, SP.

It was first presented in Spanish at the 5th National Free Software Congress in Caracas, Venezuela, on July 17, 2009, and then on September 17, 2009, at COSECOL in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic.

Also on Friday, April 18, 2008, at FISL, FSFLA launched "O Porco e a Caixa", the translation to Brazilian Portuguese of MCM's "The Pig and the Box", a book that teaches the perils of DRM to children. I printed some 500 copies, but the organizers of FISL liked it so much that they announced in the closing session that we'd print 10000 copies for FISL 10. Yay! In the end, it didn't happen, but it was very exciting nevertheless.

On May 6, 2010, I had the wonderful and very exciting opportunity to tell the story to 7- and 8-year-old students of a public school in João Pessoa, at IV ENSOL. Thanks to the organizers for pulling it off. It was told to school children again on August 31, 2011, in Santarém, at FASOL 2011.

On Fri 13th of April, 2007, I first presented Free Software and the Matrix at FISL 8.0. The presentation (in Portuguese, English and Spanish), the trailers and the sources are available here.

It was presented on April 28, 2007, at FLISoL Campinas; on May 2, 2007, at USP-EACH; on May 26, 2007 at IV ESLAM; on June 6, 2007 at SESOL3; on August 9, 2007 at 7mas Jornadas Regionales de Software Libre, in Córdoba, Argentina; on Oct 18, 2007 at Convención Visión 2007 in Lima, Peru; on Oct 18-20 at Encontro Mineiro de Software Livre in Lavras, Minas Gerais, Brazil (presented by José Monserrat Neto, thanks!); on Nov 19-21 at the Academic Week of Computing and Internet Systems at Univali, in Itajaí, SC, Brazil (presented by Fabricio Bortoluzzi); on Dec 5, 2007, at VI Semana [GNU/]Linux Universidad Distrital, in Bogota, Colombia; on March 4, 2009, opening the Free Software Lectures series at University of Campinas; and on April 15, 2009, transmitted on FLISOL TV out of Panamá City, as part of FLISOL 2009 pre-events; on May 9, 2009, by Tiago Maluta to the freshmen at Federal University of Itajubá; and at the 5th National Free Software Congress in Caracas, Venezuela, on July 18, 2009.

On April 25, 2007, FSFLA liberated the formerly-non-Free Brazilian Income Tax form-filling software. The Free Software version, IRPF2007-Livre, is available here. The history is covered in detail here.

I've talked about this in detail on Aug 10, 2007, at FSFLA's presentation at 7mas Jornadas Regionales de Software Libre, in Córdoba, Argentina, and I'll do so again on Dec 6, 2007, at VI Semana [GNU/]Linux Universidad Distrital, in Bogota, Colombia.

On April 25, 2008, FSFLA liberated IRPF-Livre 2008, announced here.

On April 17, 2009, FSFLA liberated IRPF-Livre 2009, announced here.

On April 14, 2007, I first presented "Magic mirror on the net, what's the fairest license yet? A GPLv3 fairness tale." at FISL 8.0, discussing the fairness improvements of GPLv3 over version 2 with a Snow White coloring.

It was also presented on June 8, 2007 at SESOL3 and on Aug 11, 2007, at 7mas Jornadas Regionales de Software Libre, in Córdoba, Argentina; on Oct 4, 2007, at Fórum Software Livre Rio de Janeiro; Oct 20, 2007 at ./Freedom & Open Source Day, part of Convención Visión 2007 in Lima, Peru (watch the video); on Nov 13-14, 2007 at Latinoware in Foz do Iguaçu, Brasil; and on Dec 17, 2007, at UMeet 2007, an on-line conference.

On March 27, a new presentation "Software Livre: Um Bem Necessário" (Free Software: a Necessary Good) was first presented at the Regional Symposium on Digital Inclusion, organized by CDI Campinas. On March 28, it was at AtualTec 2007. It was to be presented again at FLISoL 2007, on April 28, but, by popular demand, Free Software and The Matrix was presented instead.

FSFLA Logo

On Aug 25, 2006, I first presented "As Ações Mais Legais da FSFLA" (the coolest/most legal FSFLA actions) at Festival de Software Livre da Bahia, in Lauro de Freitas. Congratulations to the organizers for the great event! I took a few pictures and recorded my presentations (in Portuguese).

In that presentation, I talk about the preference for Free Software encoded in the Brazilian Constitution, which we argue about in the context of the inconstitutionality case raised against the Free Software law in Rio Grande do Sul. Read more about it in FSFLA's news bulletin #14.

It was presented again on Oct 18, 2006, at the IV Fórum de Software Livre do Rio de Janeiro, and on Oct 20, 2006, at the III Fórum Cearense de Software Livre.

A shortened version was presented in a round table on copyrights, patents and Free Software on May 26, 2007 at IV ESLAM.

An adapted English version of this speech was presented on Nov 21, 2006, at the 5th International GPLv3 Conference in Tokyo, Japan. A video of the presentation is available out of the conference web site. I took a few pictures while I was there.

The latest presentation of this English version was on December 13, 2006, as part of UMeet 2006. A recording (IRC logs) is available here.

On April 13, 2007, an updated version of this speech was delivered by all FSFLA board members, at FISL 8.0.

In general, I play this great movie on Trusted Computing after talking about DRM.

It was also presented on May 25, 2007 at IV ESLAM.

It was presented for the first time in Spanish on August 10, 2007, at 7mas Jornadas Regionales de Software Libre, in Córdoba, Argentina. A slightly extended version was presented on Dec 6, 2007, at VI Semana [GNU/]Linux Universidad Distrital, in Bogota, Colombia.

The 2008 version of this speech updates on Softwares Impostos, Free Open Standards, and launches, on April 18, at FISL, the first print of the Brazilian Portuguese translation of MCM's "The Pig and the Box" and FSFLA's "¡Sé Libre!" (Be Free!) campaign for the promotion of the fundamental social values of the Free Software movement. It was also presented on August, 21, 2008, at CESoL-CE, and elsewhere, combined with the campaign against tobraco. The apology to software users portion at the end of this speech was recorded in Spanish for FLISOL 2009, listen to this and other recorded speeches here

October 1, 2006, is elections day in Brazil. The "ultimate" electronic voting system used in Brazil enables results to be published just a few hours after polls are closed. And there has never been any proof of corruption in the results. If you can read Portuguese, see why that's not surprising. You may also be interested in the Free Software program I wrote that attempts to present results for the polls, similarly to the MS-Windows-only program that the Superior Electoral Court (TSE) publishes.

I came up with a way to optimize access to Thread-Local Storage, i.e., variables managed by the run-time system such that they hold a different value in each thread of execution. Find out more about it here. See the paper and the slides presented on June 29 at the GCC Summit 2006; on June 7, 2007, at SESOL3; and on March 17, 2008, at Bossa'08 Conference.

Glauber talked about his port of these ideas to ARM at [GNU/]Linux Kongress 2006 on Sept 8, 2006.

Former Brazilian President Fernando Collor de Mello with a censoring mark on top of where his middle finger would be

For FISL 7.0, in April 2006, I came up with the presentation O Poder Libertador do Segundo Dedo (that translates to English as The Freeing Power of the Second Finger). Besides the important Free Software-related issues that I feel I always have to talk about, it shows how Free Software users at an advantage position over proprietary software users, especially corporate ones, because while both recognize the need for support (pointing to someone when things go wrong), only Free Software users can use another finger, without the fear of getting to a dead end, when things keep on going wrong. A poor-ish recording of the presentation at the Festival de Software Livre da Bahia, in Portuguese, is available here.

It was presented on August 30, 2011, in Santarém, at FASOL 2011.

It was presented again on Oct 17, 2006, at the IV Fórum de Software Livre do Rio de Janeiro, and on Oct 19, 2006, at the III Fórum Cearense de Software Livre

The latest presentation in English was on December 13, 2006, as part of UMeet 2006. A recording (IRC logs) is available here.

On April 23, 2009, it was first presented in Spanish, as part of FLISOL 2009 Tour, in Chitré, Herrera province, Panamá, in combination with A Beautiful Mind Meets Free Software and The Competitive Advantages of Free Software. Attendants took pictures and shot videos.

Thanks to the authors of the TV Show Casseta & Planeta for the inspiration, even if with a delay of 15 years or so :-) May Bussunda, probably the most well-known member of this great team of comedy writers and actors, who passed away in Germany during the Soccer World Cup, rest in peace and not be forgotten :-(

John Forbes Nash, Jr

As of June, 2005, I came up with a newer presentation entitled A Beautiful Mind Meets Free Software: Game Theory, Competition and Cooperation. It was first presented to a wide audience on June 4, 2005, at FISL 6.0, after a presentation to prof Tiemi Sakata's students in Sorocaba. It was also presented at the III ESLAM, on October 13, 2005 in Manaus, AM (I took some pictures there); 5tas Jornadas Regionales de Software Libre, in Rosario, Santa Fe, Argentina, on Nov 21, 2005; Portalcon Software Livre's 1o GNU/Linux Day, in Americana, SP; at the Workshop Cearense de Software Livre e Mobilidade on December 13, 2005, in Fortaleza, CE; on Oct 20, 2006, at the III Fórum Cearense de Software Livre, also in Fortaleza; at the Brazilian finals of the 2006/2007 ACM International Collegiate Programming Contest, on November 11, 2006.

The paper on it was published at the Exact Sciences Colloquium at Uninove, on November 25, 2006. There's a nicer (IMHO) LaTeX rendering too. I've recorded the presentation audio (Ogg Speex format), in Portuguese, but the quality is unfortunately quite poor :-(

On April 23, 2009, it was first presented in Spanish, as part of FLISOL 2009 Tour, in Chitré, Herrera province, Panamá, in combination with The Freeing Power of the Second Finger and The Competitive Advantages of Free Software.

I'd like to thank my wife, Islene, for the drawings.

If you're interested in economics involving Free Software, in addition to the sites mentioned in the presentation, you may want to read:

The evolution of man, hacked by Islene for my presentation of ``The Competitive Advantages of Free Software ́ ́

I wrote a paper entitled ``The Competitive Advantages of Free Software ́ ́, originally for the Workshop about Free Software 2000, a parallel event to the 1st Free Software International Forum 2000. The originally published version is available as a gzipped postscript for ISO-A4 paper. An updated version (last modified on August 13, 2001, except for the addition of copyright and redistribution terms on July 19, 2002) is available as browsable html and pdf for letter-sized paper.

After many presentations all over from 2000 to 2002, it was later presented at FISL 4.0, some time in June, 2003; on Oct 20, 2006, at the III Fórum Cearense de Software Livre.

The latest version of the slides used in my presentation at several different conferences is available in pdf format.

On April 22, 2009, it was first presented in Spanish, as part of FLISOL 2009 Tour, in Panamá City, and on April 23, 2009, in Chitré, Herrera province, Panamá, in combination with The Freeing Power of the Second Finger and A Beautiful Mind Meets Free Software. It was also presented on August 8, 2015 at ECSL 2015 in San Pedro Sula, Honduras.

These are some Free Software projects I'm involved with (even though I'm mostly inactive on most of them, except for the first two):

Some other projects I've already contributed to in the past, or would like to contribute to in the future, if I manage to get more than 24 hours a day :-)

You may find some source and binary packages for Red Hat Linux that I've packaged here.

I've written some notes on addressing the few problems I ran into while setting up Fedora Core 3 Test 3 on my (then) shiny new Compaq Presario r3004 Athlon64 notebook. They apply to Fedora Core 3 as well.

Fedora Core 2 shipped without Firewire modules because they were severely broken in the upstream kernel. Kernel updates are fixed, but if you want to install it or use the original kernels, read this.

I've taught a short Java course in the Second Brazilian Symposium on Programming Languages. The errata of the course notes (in Portuguese) are available on-line. If you want a copy of the (outdated) course notes (also in Portuguese), please let me know.

Between 1995 and 1997, I taught Maths in a school that helps poor students improve their chances of succeeding in the College Entrance Examination (Vestibular). You may find out more about this social project and read its monthly publication in the home page of Cursinho DCE (in Portuguese).

You may find some jokes and funny stories I have collected here.

My snail-mail address and my Gnu Privacy Guard public key (signed by my older key) are available.

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