Dumping a list of installed packages on a Debian system

Last Updated on September 30, 2010 by Dave Farquhar

Yes, Todd, I’m posting an update from work. This’ll save me from wasting time on Google later in life.
Use the command dpkg --get-selections to generate a list of all the installed packages. If you want to replicate a system quickly (say, for disaster recovery or system deployment), redirect the package list to a file (dpkg --get-selections >packagelist). Then, as long as you have a copy of the file, you can install a minimal Debian system and turn it into a replica of the other system with nothing more than an Internet connection and a few commands:

dpkg --get-selections |sed 's/\(de\)*install/purge/' | > dpkg --set-selections

dpkg --set-selections 
dselect install

And they say Windows’ TCO is lower than Linux…

Dave Farquhar

David Farquhar is a computer security professional, entrepreneur, and author. He has written professionally about computers since 1991, so he was writing about retro computers when they were still new. He has been working in IT professionally since 1994 and has specialized in vulnerability management since 2013. He holds Security+ and CISSP certifications. Today he blogs five times a week, mostly about retro computers and retro gaming covering the time period from 1975 to 2000.