We have reported earlier of the Russian government building a Linux distro for their use. In all probability, the build is nearing a final version now as Vladimir Putin has ordered the government to move to Linux.

The new system will be operational from the second quarter of 2012 and the initial phase will start in Q2 of 2011. After this transition, which is expected to be complete by 2015, the federal government including all the states will run Linux.

Vladimir Putin has been attempting to switch over to Linux from a long time now. However, his repeated attempts back from 2007 will come to fruition finally only after the next five years. However, this time it is not the much longed for education sector that is switching over. Now that the political opposition to the idea has diffused, we can expect to see the matter proceed as planned.

In this translated document from Cnews, you can see that the whole procedure has been broken into parts, one of which deals with creating a repository for use in Russia exclusively. Open source is an effective cost cutting measure and is in use by many governments across the globe. Russia being one of the largest countries, its embracing Open Source is a positive sign and influence for many other countries.