Lately, I'm finding myself setting up the same set of packages on Ubuntu as I build not just lots of virtual machines, but as I'm converting some of my Windows workstations and servers over to Ubuntu as well. To replicate the process, I looked at building a custom installation CD, but that seemd the wrong approach. At least in part because of the fact that each variation would require a new CD ISO and the storage requirements would get out of hand.

However, Debian and Ubuntu have a handy way to get a list of everything that the aptitude package manager is keeping track of. Since that package management system is the main reason *why* many people are using Ubuntu or Debian, that means pretty much everything that's installed. And, since this list is in plain text, it's easy to edit and tweak, with each configuration taking up next to no space.

This article shows a basic version of getting this list into a file and even emailing the file to get it off of the machine in question and into my email.

Full Article.