DEX

Welcome to DEX - improving Debian and its derivatives through cross-community teamwork

Why DEX?

Debian is a great general-purpose operating system itself, but Debian's collection of modular packages is also an excellent platform for building other operating systems. There are over 300 distributions which are, directly or transitively, based on Debian.

Some of these are developed within the Debian project, while many others are managed as separate projects. These child projects are self-directed, and their goals are generally focused on a specific category of users. For example, Ubuntu aims to provide an easy-to-use operating system for PCs.

In the pursuit of their goals, derivatives make various changes and improvements to Debian packages. Often, these changes would benefit Debian and other derivatives, but do not make their way back into Debian proper.

It is hard work to coordinate a single community project. Working across projects is even harder. Although there is often a desire to cooperate, both in Debian and in derivative projects, this can be difficult in practice.

Our Approach

The Debian derivatives front desk helps derivatives cooperate with Debian by providing informational resources, a point of contact and discussion forum for derivatives, as well as an ongoing census.

DEX works with the front desk and complements it by organizing cross-distribution working groups to monitor and merge changes from derivatives into Debian proper. In DEX, derivative developers and Debian developers work side-by-side to merge changes into Debian.

Who is DEX?

The DEX project is organized by:

Current DEX projects and teams include:

Get Involved

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