DebConf 2026 bid for Santa Fe, Argentina
Contents
Why do we want to host Debconf 2026 in Santa Fe?
Locally, we believe that it is important to boost the Debian Argentina community again. In the City of Santa Fe, in the Faculty of Engineering and Water Sciences of Universidad Nacional del Litoral (FICH-UNL), we have the Technical Universitary career in Free Software (Tecnicatura Universitaria en Software Libre, TUSL), which many of its subjects use Debian as the Debian operating system. We believe it is more than fitting to invite students to collaborate in the Debian Project.
It is also important to emphasize that both at the National University of Litoral and, in several technical departments, the Province of Santa Fe's government, Debian or Debian-based operating systems are used on their servers, which is why it is important that workers and authorities can recognize the importance of this community.
Finally, we think it is important to try to articulate with different social communities that take into account the technological imprints with social purposes that are developed locally and that articulate with the principles of the Debian community.
And why do you want to come to Argentina?
Argentina is a prime tourist destination, for those that want to arrive before or depart after DebConf! This is a big country, of course (almost 3 million square kilometers, not counting the Antarctic territorial claim), and if you want to make tourism... you should plan on spending some time in transport!
Argentina is very diverse. We have cosmopolitan city life in our three major cities, Buenos Aires, Rosario and Córdoba; you will find plenty of occasions to enjoy the unique tango and to go to museums and other attractions. The Argentinian passion for fútbol can also be felt in the many stadiums in said cities.
The South of the country (Patagonia) has beautiful glaciers and natural parks you won't find in any other tourist destination.
The West has the Andes mountain ridge, with beautiful landscapes. Close to Mendoza you will find Aconcagua, the highest mountain in America. The Andes' slopes are home to one of the best wine regions in the world, with Mendoza, San Juan, La Rioja and Catamarca is the best known wine-producing provinces. The North-West (Salta, Jujuy, Tucumán) is renowned for its folklore, with the oldest founded cities in Argentina.
The North East dips into the jungle, in Misiones, hosting the best part (sorry, Brazilian friends, but truth must be told! 😉) of the Iguazú Falls, the largest waterfalls in the world.
Santa Fe in particular is located at one of the branches of the Paraná river system. The Paraná river is one of the longest and widest rivers in the world, and its ecosystem and landscapes are very rich. Across the river and not far to the South, in the Entre Ríos province, we have the Pre-Delta national park.
Bid presentation during DebConf
Local Team
The local team lead is Martín Bayo. Martín has attended DebConf19 and DebConf24, and was the initial coordinator for TUSL.
Emmanuel is a DD. He not strictly local: He lives in a different province of Argentina. He has been to Santa Fe for MiniDebConf in 2024, and is willing to invest his time as an organizer.
The rest of the people named have helped for MiniDebConf in 2024 and are committed to aiding Free Software activities, and we will confirm their participation if the bid is accepted.
- Martín Bayo
- Emmanuel Arias
- Leonardo Martinez(to be confirmed)
- Mariano Kunte(to be confirmed)
- Guillermo Russo(to be confirmed)
- Gabriela Rodriguez(to be confirmed)
- Oscar Vallejos(to be confirmed)
- Cristian Quinteros(to be confirmed)
Remote «local» team
Gunnar Wolf: Lives in Mexico, ~7000Km away, but lived for six months in the neighboring city of Paraná, has been a teacher at TUSL, and has long pushed for this bid to mature and become viable. Is fluent in Argentinian idiosincracies, and will commit to be an "almost-local" team member.
Santiago Ruano: Lives in neighboring Uruguay. He organized MiniDebConf Montevideo in 2023, is the instigator and remote-local team for DebConf25. We will try not to overload him for two ?DebConfs in a row, but he has accepted to be involved as semi-local as well.
Venue
FICH - Facultad de Ingenieria y Ciencias Hídricas The FICH is located in the university campus of Santa Fe, 4km from the city center.
This is a relatively new university campus (built ~25 years ago), and offers a variety of work spaces, from smaller rooms to auditoriums.
At FICH, we have access to one auditorium for 150 people (actually at the Architecture faculty, the building next door), one auditorium for 120 people, and many smaller rooms.
In case we needed larger capacity auditoriums, as a second possibility we can move the whole conference to the Historical Block building, belonging to the Juridical Sciences faculty. It is also available to us, and has larger rooms; we have chosen the FICH building because of its tighter community-building facilities and having a single, big hotel for most of our attendees.
Accommodation
The hotel is located 500 meters from the faculty, and 100 meters from the east coast of Laguna Setúbal, which separates the campus from the city. In the coastline you can do different sports, and there are some bars and restaurants to eat.
They already answered they can provide rooms for ~ 140 persons
https://www.hotelunlate.com.ar/index
Hotel rooms enjoy a good level of comfort, and the hotel has several rooms that can be used as night hacklabs / work spaces.
There are several other hotels in the city center, less than 4Km away.
To do: Prices of the hotels. Do the prices include breakfast?
Weather
The weather in winter is usually around 5°C to 17°C. Sunny and rainy days are often interleaved, although Winter rains (we are in the Southern hemisphere) are rarely very strong.
Transport
Entering the country
You will most likely enter Argentina by the Ezeiza airport, near Buenos Aires. Most international flights arrive there.
https://www.aeropuertosargentina.com/ezeiza
https://tableros.yvera.tur.ar/conectividad/
Getting to Santa Fe: by air
Most domestic flights from Buenos Aires (and all flights to Santa Fe) leave from a different airport, located by Río de la Plata, within Buenos Aires' city limits.
(Aeroparque Jorge Newbery (ANAC: AER - IATA: AEP - OACI: SABE) you arrive in aeropuerto Sauce Viejo https://www.santafe.gob.ar/ms/aeropuerto-sauce-viejo/
Getting to Santa Fe: by bus
From the Ezeiza airport, you can take a bus to the Retiro bus terminal in central Buenos Aires. Tienda Leon transfers offers a service in around 40 minutes; there is a regular city transfer bus (línea 8) that takes around 2 hours.
From Retiro, several companies will drive you to Santa Fe, it is a 5-6 hour trip. Argentinian long distance buses are very comfortable.
You can also take a bus to Santa Fe directly from the airport with Tienda Leon transfers, although they must be booked in advance, are sensibly more expensive, and less comfortable than regular buses.
Visa policy
Most American and European countries are visa exempt, and most African and Asian countries need to tramit a visa or electronic travel autorization (ETA / AVE).
Visa price is $150 for nationalities that need it.
https://www.migraciones.gov.ar/accesible/indexdnm.php?visas
https://www.migraciones.gov.ar/ave/
Internet connection
FICH currently has 2×750MBps connections to Internet. Additional bandwidth can be hired upon request.
To do: Status of wireless networking?
Accessibility
To do
Food
To do. We have had some preliminary talks with a caterer, that can potentially provide food for ~200 people, twice a day (assuming the hotel provides breakfast), for around US$4 per person per meal. To do: provide some menu examples.
Conference dinner
To do
Cheese and wine party
Where: To do
Import policies: To do
We have lots of good, cheap national wine 😃
Legal organization
We have approached two legal entities with experiences helping organize international activities, and they are sympathetic towards working with us. We don't want to publicly commit them to participating at this stage.
Open questions / Challenges
- Historically, transferring money in and out of Argentina has proven to be a challenge. How can we route around this?