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<sect1 id="repository-directories-section-2" xreflabel="trunk/Identity" label="4.2">
    <title><filename class="directory">trunk/Identity</filename></title>

    <para>This directory implements The CentOS Project
    <emphasis>corporate identity</emphasis> based on the The CentOS
    Project <emphasis>mission</emphasis> and <emphasis>release
    schema</emphasis>.</para>

    <sect2 id="corporate-mission" xreflabel="The corporate mission" label="4.2.1">

        <title>The corporate mission</title>

        <para>The CentOS Project exists to provide The CentOS
        Distribution.  Additionally, The CentOS Project provides The
        CentOS Web and The CentOS Showroom to support and promote the
        existence of The CentOS Distribution, respectively.</para>

    </sect2>

    <sect2 id="corporate-identity" xreflabel="The corporate identity" label="4.2.2">
        <title>The corporate identity</title>

        <para>The CentOS Project corporate identity is the ``persona''
        of the organization known as The CentOS Project.  The CentOS
        Project corporate identity plays a significant role in the way
        The CentOS Project, as organization, presents itself to both
        internal and external stakeholders. In general terms, The
        CentOS Project corporate identity expresses the values and
        ambitions of The CentOS Project organization, its business,
        and its characteristics.</para>  

        <para>The CentOS Project corporate identity provides
        visibility, recognizability, reputation, structure and
        identification to The CentOS Project organization by means of
        <emphasis>corporate design</emphasis>, <emphasis>corporate
        communication</emphasis>, and <emphasis>corporate
        behaviour</emphasis>.</para>

    </sect2>

    <sect2 id="corporate-design" xreflabel="The corporate design" label="4.2.3">

        <title>The corporate design</title>

        <para>The corporate design is focused on the effective
        communication of corporate messages. Corporate messages are
        all the information emitted from the corporation to a target
        audience.  In order for such communication to happen, it is
        required to put the messages on a medium available for the
        target audience to react upon.  These media are know as
        <emphasis>corporate manifestations</emphasis>, because the
        corporation manifests its existence through them. The specific
        way used by the corporation to set their messages on different
        media is what the corporate design is about.</para>

        <para>The amount of manifestations a corporation uses to
        communicate its existence may very from one corporation to
        another. In the very specific case of The CentOS Project, the
        following corporate manifestations come to mind:</para>

        <orderedlist>
            <listitem>

                <para>The CentOS Distribution &mdash; The CentOS
                Distribution corporate manifestaion is made from SRPM
                packages. There are packages that make a remarkable
                use of images (e.g., Anaconda, Grub, Syslinux, Gdm,
                Kdm, Gsplash, Ksplash, Rhgb, Firstboot, etc.),
                packages that make a moderated use of images and
                packages that don't use images at all.  Also, there
                are some packages that make use of text-based
                information that need to be changed, too (e.g.,
                release notes, eula, the welcome page of the web
                browser, etc.), in order for The CentOS Project to
                comply with upstream's redistribution guidelines.  The
                CentOS Distribution corporate manifestation focuses
                its attention on SRPM packages that do use images in a
                remarkable way, specifically those packages that
                involve upstream branding, and those files with
                text-based information that need to be changed. This
                way, through image and text-based files, is
                implemented the corporate design of The CentOS
                Distribution corporate manifestations (i.e., all the
                releases of the operating system).</para>

            </listitem>
            <listitem>

                <para>The CentOS Web &mdash; This corporate
                manifestation exists to support The CentOS
                Distribution corporate manifestation.  The CentOS Web
                corporate manifestation covers web applications used
                by The CentOS Project to manifest its existence on the
                Internet.  These web applications are free software
                and come from different providers which distribute
                their work with predefined visual styles.  Frequently,
                these predefined visual styles have no visual relation
                among themselves and introduce some visual
                contraditions when they all are put together.  These
                visual contraditions need to be removed in order to
                comply with The CentOS Project corporate structure
                guidelines.</para>

            </listitem>
            <listitem>

                <para>The CentOS Showroom &mdash; This corporate
                manifestation exists to promote The CentOS
                Distribution.  The CentOS Showroom corporate
                manifestation covers industrial production of objects
                branded by The CentOS Project (e.g., clothes,
                stationery and installation media).  These branded
                objects are for distribution on social events and/or
                shops.  They provide a way of promotion and a route
                for commercialization that may help to aliviate The
                CentOS Project expenses (e.g., hosting, servers,
                full-time-developers, etc.), in a similar way as
                donations may do.</para>

            </listitem>
        </orderedlist>

        <para>The corporate manifestations above seem to cover all the
        media required by The CentOS Project, as organization, to show
        its existence.  However, other corporate manifestations could
        be added in the future, if needed, to cover different areas
        like building, offices, transportation and whaterver medium
        The CentOS Project thouches to show its existence.</para> 

    </sect2>

    <sect2 id="corporate-communication" xreflabel="The corporate
    communication" label="4.2.4">

        <title>The corporate communication</title>

        <para> The CentOS Project corporate communication is based on
        <emphasis>community communication</emphasis> and takes place
        through the following avenues: 

        <itemizedlist>
            <listitem><para>The CentOS Chat (#centos, #centos-social},
#centos-devel on irc.freenode.net)</para></listitem>
            <listitem><para>The CentOS Mailing Lists (<ulink url="http://lists.centos.org/" />).</para></listitem>
            <listitem><para>The CentOS Forums (<ulink url="http://forums.centos.org/" />).</para></listitem>
            <listitem><para>The CentOS Wiki (<ulink url="http://wiki.centos.org/" />).</para></listitem>
            <listitem><para>Social events, interviews, conferences, etc.</para></listitem>
        </itemizedlist>
        
        </para>

    </sect2>

    <sect2 id="corporate-behaviour" xreflabel="The corporate behaviour"
    label="4.2.5">

        <title>The corporate behaviour</title>

        <para>The CentOS Project corporate behaviour is based on
        <emphasis>community behaviour</emphasis> which take place in
        <xref linkend="corporate-communication" />.</para>

    </sect2>

    <sect2 id="corporate-structure" xreflabel="The corporate structure"
    label="4.2.6">
        
            <title>The corporate structure</title>

            <para> The CentOS Project corporate structure is based on
            a <emphasis>monolithic corporate visual identity
            structure</emphasis>.  In this configuration, one unique
            name and one unique visual style is used in all corporate
            manifestations of The CentOS Project.</para>

            <para>In a monolithic corporate visual identity structure,
            internal and external stakeholders feel a strong sensation
            of uniformity, orientation, and identification with the
            organization. No matter if you are visiting web sites,
            using the distribution, or acting on social events, the
            one unique name and one unique visual style connects them
            all to say: <emphasis>Hey! we are all part of The CentOS
            Project</emphasis>.</para>

            <para>Other corporate structures for The CentOS Project
            have been considered as well. Such is the case of
            producing one different visual style for each major
            release of The CentOS Distribution. This structure isn't
            inconvenient at all, but some visual contradictions could
            be introduced if it isn't applied correctly and we need to
            be aware of it. To apply it correctly, we need to know
            what The CentOS Project is made of.</para>

            <para>The CentOS Project, as organization, is mainly made
            of (but not limited to) three corporate manifestions: The
            CentOS Distribution, The CentOS Web and The CentOS
            Showroom.  Inside The CentOS Distribution corporate
            manifestations, The CentOS Project maintains near to four
            different major releases of The CentOS Distribution (e.g.,
            the operating system), parallely in time.  However, inside
            The CentOS Web visual manifestations, the content is
            produced for no specific release information (e.g., there
            is no a complete web site for each major release of The
            CentOS Distribution individually, but one web site to
            cover them all).  Likewise, the content produced in The
            CentOS Showroom is created for no release-specific at all,
            but for The CentOS Project in general.</para>

            <para>In order to produce the correct corporate structure
            for The CentOS Project, we need to concider all the
            corporate manifestations The CentOS Project is made of,
            not just one of them.  If one different visual style is
            used for each major release of The CentOS Distribution,
            which one of those different visual styles would be used
            to cover the remaining visual manifestations The CentOS
            Project is made of (e.g., The CentOS Web and The CentOS
            Showroom)?</para>

            <para>Probably you are thinking, that's right, but The
            CentOS Brand connects them all already, why would we need
            to join them up into the same visual style too, isn't it
            more work to do, and harder to maintain?</para>

            <para>Harder to maintain, more work to do, probably.
            Specially when you consider that The CentOS Project has
            proven stability and consistency through time and, that,
            certainly, didn't come through swinging magical wands or
            something but hardly working out to automate tasks and
            providing maintainance through time. Said that, we
            consider that The CentOS Project corporate structure must
            be consequent with such stability and consistency
            tradition, beyond the work it might require initially. It
            is true that The CentOS Brand does connect all the visual
            manifestations it is present on, but that connection would
            be stronger if one unique visual style backups it, too.
            In fact, whatever thing you do to strength the visual
            connection among The CentOS Project corporate
            manifestations would be very good in favor of The CentOS
            Project recognition.</para>

            <para>Obviously, having just one visual style in all
            corporate manifestations for eternity would be a very
            boring thing and would give the impression of a visually
            dead project.  So, there is no problem on creating a brand
            new visual style for each new major release of The CentOS
            Distribution, in order to refresh The CentOS Distribution
            visual style; the problem itself is in not propagating the
            brand new visual style created for the new release of The
            CentOS Distribution to all other visual manifestations The
            CentOS Project is made of, in a way The CentOS Project
            could be recognized no matter what corporate manifestation
            be in front of us. Such lack of uniformity is what
            introduces the visual contradition we are precisely trying
            to solve by mean of themes production in the CentOS
            Artwork Repository.</para>

    </sect2>

</sect1>