#1 How do I install the backup files?

[Arjan van Lent]

I make the backup but I don't know how to install it.

[Arjan van Lent]

First of all I like to say that the backups you made are not full system backups but only include information about the packages you had installed and info about where to download these packages.

Backups made can be restored on simulair Debian/Ubuntu based systems and can be installed without installing anything in advance. The packages are just simple software installation packages and you can install them the way you install any package. On Desktop systems this just takes a double click on the package to launch the package installer and on text based systems it just takes a couple of simple commands:

sudo dpkg -i my-repo-backup.deb (if you did create a repository backup you must install this one first!!)
sudo apt-get update (with this command you will refresh the repositories and add the new info to apt)
sudo dpkg -i my-meta-backup.deb (this one installs your applications)

As far as I have tested the packages work on simulair systems like Ubuntu/kubuntu also on upgrades but also Debian/Ubuntu is possible. I did not test it but maby you could even use alien to convert the debs to rpm's and use those on rpm based systems. Creating backups is possible on all systems providing aptitude and dpkg.