The use of open source software is empowering ACES Sintra, a public health care organisation in the municipality of Sintra (Portugal). The organisation is dispersed over 40 different offices, and its IT department manages over 400 workstations and server hosts.
Open source tools used by ACES Sintra include content management system Wordpress, combined with the usual LAMP stack: the MySQL database management system, the Apache web server, Linux for the server host and the PHP web development scripting language. The combination is used for the public website, but also for several internal Intranet project and team sites. The organisation implements Wiki websites, mainly for the IT department but also to maintain a list of frequently asked questions and their answers.
ACES Sintra uses all kinds of Linux distributions, says Vasco Leiria, a computer technician for the organisation. Some of the desktops run Ubuntu and Lubuntu, and servers run either CentOS, Debian or Ubuntu. “We even run a few hosts on FreeBSD.”
Other open source solutions include Pfsense for proxy and firewall server, Zabbix for monitoring the IT infrastructure, Proxmox to manage virtual servers and Urbackup, for managing backups. “We also use Raspberry Pis, as print and DHCP servers.” The IT department itself using http://osticket.com/ Osticket, an open source system to provide its help desks services.
Improve inspections, case management
Wordpress was selected because the open source community can provide support in Portuguese as well as English, says the computer technician. “The software can handle multiple languages, and comes complete with tools to keep it updated and that helps to prevent security breaches”, he says. “We are also adding some management tools to our Wordpress implementation, making it possible to manage documents and create workflows”, Leiria says.
ACES Sintra needed to implement an internal platform for the dissemination of information, Leiria says. “The solution came at very low cost as Wordpress was installed on existing computer hardware.” The system, delivered in 2013, is now intensely used by the ACES Sintra staffers, for sharing information, exchanging files, and keep up to date on activities.
Leiria was one of the speakers at a recent workshop in Lisbon on open source and open standards. The workshop was organised by by AMA, Portugal’s Agency for Administrative Modernisation, and ESOP, a trade group for open source ICT service providers.
More information:
Vasco Leiria’s presentation (in Portuguese)
AMA’s 10th session on Open Source and Open Standards (in Portuguese)