Canaima GNU/Linux is an open source operating system. It is a Linux distribution based on the architecture of Debian. It was created as a solution to cover the needs of the Venezuelan Government as a response to presidential decree 3,390 that prioritizes the use of free and open source technologies in the public administration. On March 14, 2011, Canaima was officially established as the default operating system for the Venezuelan public administration.
The operating system has gained a strong foothold and is one of the most used Linux distributions in Venezuela, largely because of its incorporation in public schools. It is being used in large scale projects as "Canaima Educativo", a project aimed at providing school children with a basic laptop computer with educational software nicknamed Magallanes. Use of Canaima has been presented on international congresses about the use of open standards, Despite being a young development, it has been used on the Festival Latinoamericano de Instalación de Software Libre (FLISOL).

Some of the major features of Canaima GNU/Linux are:
Desktop of Canaima Popular 2.0
- Easy installation
- Software license cost is free.
- Free distribution and use.

The Free Software Foundation (FSF) states that Canaima GNU/Linux is not 100% free software. This is because of the fact that some of its components are nonfree software, in particular some firmware needed for graphic cards, sound cards, printers, etc. Canaima creators opted to include these nonfree drivers in order to support as many computers being used by the Venezuelan government as possible, and to facilitate the migration from a closed source operating system to an open source but nonfree one. It is expected that Canaima, in its upcoming releases, offers an option in the installation process for nonfree drivers to be optional, being able to install a 100% free software image of the distribution if the user choose to.

Included Software
Canaima includes applications for training, development and system configuration. The Graphical User Interface (GUI) and desktop environment by default is GNOME. There are other desktop environments and GUIs maintained by the community for the system, like Xfce.
Personalized Canaima GNU/LINUX 3.0 desktop

Productivity: The office software suite LibreOffice, with word processor, spreadsheet, presentation program, it includes other more specific programs like project management software Planner and a HTML editor.
Internet: Includes the Cunaguaro browser, a web browser based on Iceweasel and adapted especially for Canaima 3.0 and onwards. Canaima Curiara, is a light web browser based on Cunaguaro, developed in python-webkit for specific applications on the distribution.
Graphics: Includes Gimp, Inkscape, desktop publishing software Scribus and gLabels labels designer.