Debian/Backups

normally, I wouldn't worry about backing up executables easier to just reinstall if disaster strikes

ryouma: what about "reinstall" directive? e.g., aptitude reinstall ... what can be nice to have a backup of is the list of installed packages, just that tiny file you would get from dpkg --get-selections. then you can restore it even easier

!aptitude clone To clone a Debian machine using aptitude (or install your favourite packages) use aptitude search --disable-columns -F%p '~i!~M!~v' > package_list; on              the reference machine; xargs aptitude --schedule-only install < package_list; aptitude install; on the other machine. This preserves information about "automatically installed" packages that other methods do not. See also, , , . mutante: I like that over --get-selections because it saves autoinstall info

i like since not all machines have aptitude

the problem with --set-selections is it marks it all as manually installed

mutante: here's another alternative: apt-mark showmanual > pkg_list; then on target; xargs apt-get install < pkg_list