> In my Linux days I'd just make a copy of /etc and my home directory and that was always enough to get a new machine, install Debian, run a few aptitude commands, restore /etc and move on.
Even better: go make a VCS-repo for your /etc. It's absolutely great.
I have /etc in a git repo, and an hourly cron job to commit whatever there is to be committed (I should probably use icrod instead of cron, but right now, I'm too lazy.) That way you can fix mistakes that got introduced sometime in the past, and you can see the diffs between different versions of your configuration. Of course, it has the same benefit of being able to just clone the configuration on another machine.
EXCEPT, you also get to set up different branches for different hosts, if you need that, but that might be overdoing it already.
Seriously, try keeping more stuff under VCS. I use it for my ~/, my most important dotfiles, and /etc. Great thing.
Even better: go make a VCS-repo for your /etc. It's absolutely great.
I have /etc in a git repo, and an hourly cron job to commit whatever there is to be committed (I should probably use icrod instead of cron, but right now, I'm too lazy.) That way you can fix mistakes that got introduced sometime in the past, and you can see the diffs between different versions of your configuration. Of course, it has the same benefit of being able to just clone the configuration on another machine. EXCEPT, you also get to set up different branches for different hosts, if you need that, but that might be overdoing it already.
Seriously, try keeping more stuff under VCS. I use it for my ~/, my most important dotfiles, and /etc. Great thing.