[Aptitude-devel] What I'm really missing in aptitude / synaptic

[MNO]

Thank you Daniel,

I really hope that aptitude will have it as an option in it's menu to export
and import the selections.

At least i now learned how to do this with dpkg which is very helpful right
now.

for the config files i'll just save all .conf, .ini etc.

What i try to do is following:

Export the selections for a pre configured machines, like this:
- HP Vectra 420 Office,
- Compaq iPaq internet kiosk
- HP EVO File server

I'm helping someone who is running a low budget Internet cafe in Africa.
Harddrive failure is one of the most common issues, and backups are the
second issue.

So if i can store at least the selections on a web server and have an easy
way to apply them to a fresh install then i'm half way ready.

I'm just trying to figure out a way to save custom machine configurations
but as small as possible. And i was wondering why aptitude didn't give me
this option. Anyway, i now have something to work with, and i keep hoping
for a 2 button solution. :-) I'm sure there are many people out there who
could use an option like this.

I know that to many options are a killer (Just by looking at Office
applications.) I'm having a  little vision for this option, but not the
skills to build it, So i thought "Lets donate this idea" :-)

Kind regards,

Mano.


On 8/28/07, Daniel Burrows <dburrows at debian.org> wrote:
>
> On Fri, Aug 17, 2007 at 11:42:21AM +0200, MNO <manostienen at gmail.com> was
> heard to say:
> > Dear readers,
> >
> > i hope this is the right place to post this request.
> >
> > What I'm really missing in aptitude / synaptic is:
> >
> > - a file dump of all the installed packages + the /etc/apt/sources.list.
>
>   You can do that with dpkg --get-selections and tar (to wrap up
> /etc/apt and /var/lib/aptitude, maybe /var/lib/apt too).
>
> > - a way to import the above files (from my personal website) so that i
> > can install all those packages with a few simple commands.
>
>   untar the files and run dpkg --set-selections.
>
> > - an add on that can collect all my config files.
>
>   tar will do that if you point it at /etc.  Of course, not everything
> in /etc is suitable for being moved between computers, but there's no
> information available telling tools which files to ignore.
>
>   It sounds to me like what you're asking for is either trivial or
> really hard, but I don't know which, and I don't know where aptitude is
> supposed to come into it.  It might help if you provided some use cases:
> say exactly what you want to do and exactly what should happen; I'm
> just guessing what you meant above.  Just because it's obvious to you
> doesn't mean it's obvious to me. :-)
>
>   Daniel
>
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