[ubuntu-uk] killed box through /var :P

[Neil Greenwood]

2009/1/18 William Anderson <neuro at well.com>:
> [snip]
> I'd suggest an easier path would be to do:
>
> dpkg --get-selections > /tmp/packages.txt
>
> Then take a copy of /tmp/packages.txt (and probably an archive of /etc
> as well to make a backup of key system settings), do whatever re-install
> steps you'd require, put packages.txt back in /tmp/ and then do this
> after an apt-get update && apt-get upgrade:
>
> dpkg --set-selections < /tmp/packages.txt
> apt-get -u dselect-upgrade
>

The problem with this is that it sets all the packages as manually
installed on the new installation.

Have a look at http://blog.hanno-stock.de/archives/50 for a few extra
steps that will mark libraries and dependencies as automatically
installed (then they get removed when you choose to remove the package
you originally installed, instead of becoming cruft).

HTH
Cofion,
Neil.