[lug] Personal 'layer'

[Scott Rohling]

I've been de/re/installing Linux on several machines lately here at home and
decided I needed a good way to make it easy to get all my apps back,
settings, etc.

The obvious thing to do is have a backup of /home that you restore - that
gets your data and settings back, but doesn't ensure the apps that use that
data will be available.  I decided to just create a simple script in my
/home that I can use to install the packages I use ..  for example:

install-mypackages:    (This is on Ubuntu 8.04)

#!/bin/bash
sudo apt-get install amarok xpdf x3270 prism k9copy vlc
ubuntu-restricted-extras

I came up with the above list by installing Ubuntu - and then keeping track
of what packages I knew for sure I wanted..  I just kept adding on to the
script as I thought of things until I was done.

So now I just install the system (or restore from some pristine backup) -
restore /home - and run install-mypackages..

A more elegant solution is probably to have make a .deb file (or .rpm for
RH/SUSE/etc) which 'requires' the packages I want to install and then just
install  that.

Some of my apps aren't part of the repository (or I prefer to get them from
the source) and I have .deb files for them in my /home.  So thus another
script:

install-mydebs:

#!/bin/bash
sudo dpkg -i -R ~/debinstall/*

my debinstall directory:

picasa_2.7.3736-15_i386.deb
virtualbox_1.6.4-33808_Ubuntu_hardy_i386.deb
skype-debian_2.0.0.72-1_i386.deb

And I could also just do the dpkg in install-mydebs, but for now I'm keeping
them separate.

A more elegant solution is probably to have make a .deb file (or .rpm for
RH/SUSE/etc) which 'requires' the packages I want to install as well as my
local deb files and then just install  that.

If I install programs that I know I want to have as part of my 'layer' - I
just add it to the script(s) to make sure it's there next time I rebuild.

Ok - so that's my 'easy' solution to creating a 'personal layer' to add onto
a new or rebuilt distro --   what do other people do?

Thanks for sharing -   Scott
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