# installl a bebian 8.1 from a computer to anpther computer

**URL:** <https://forum.ansible.com/t/installl-a-bebian-8-1-from-a-computer-to-anpther-computer/20638>\
**Category:** Ansible Project\
**Created:** [February 20, 2016, 7:05am UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/installl-a-bebian-8-1-from-a-computer-to-anpther-computer/20638 "2016-02-20T07:05:22Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Thierry\_Boibary-Gran](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/85e7bf/32.png) [@Thierry\_Boibary-Gran](https://forum.ansible.com/u/Thierry_Boibary-Gran)\
**Post date:** [February 20, 2016, 7:05am UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/installl-a-bebian-8-1-from-a-computer-to-anpther-computer/20638/1 "2016-02-20T07:05:22Z")

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Hi,

i have a desktop pc with Debain 8.2 and another pc with completly  
different caracteristics. i’d like to copy the entire disk of this last  
pc to the first pc to have a Debain configuration complete.

Is’it possible with Ansible?

Many thanks  
T.

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**Author:** ![Benjamin\_Redling](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/47e85d/32.png) [@Benjamin\_Redling](https://forum.ansible.com/u/Benjamin_Redling)\
**Post date:** [February 20, 2016, 8:51am UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/installl-a-bebian-8-1-from-a-computer-to-anpther-computer/20638/2 "2016-02-20T08:51:15Z")

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For that case you are better off with different solutions.  
I would have a look at "clonezilla" or "relax and recover".

As long as you are not switching the architecture (e.g. amd64 \<-\> arm)  
there rarely is a problem.  
Linux / Debian is not locked to a certain hardware.

Sometimes you want things like  
/etc/udev/rules.d/70-persistent-net.rules  
edited.  
But it should run even w/o that.

/Benjamin

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**Author:** ![Brian\_Coca](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/6de8d8/32.png) [@Brian\_Coca](https://forum.ansible.com/u/Brian_Coca)\
**Post date:** [February 20, 2016, 5:13pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/installl-a-bebian-8-1-from-a-computer-to-anpther-computer/20638/3 "2016-02-20T17:13:40Z")

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you might get into trouble with UUIDs though for both network and disks. This was much simpler before those started being used for interface assignments and mounts.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Benjamin\_Redling](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/47e85d/32.png) [@Benjamin\_Redling](https://forum.ansible.com/u/Benjamin_Redling)\
**Post date:** [February 20, 2016, 5:35pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/installl-a-bebian-8-1-from-a-computer-to-anpther-computer/20638/4 "2016-02-20T17:35:31Z")

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What do you mean by UUIDs for disks?  
Ok: all my partitions are mounted in /etc/fstab by UUID, but they get  
cloned too.  
I would rather clone the whole installation and run some shell/ansible  
scripts afterwards to make those site-wide unique again -- if needed at all!

I really like ansible but I thought there are better tools for cloning a  
whole installation if one missed the opportunity to do it with  
kickstart/preseed/FAI/... + ansible from the beginning.

(Network) booting a rescue install and scripting ansible to dd/clone/...  
seemed a bit like brute forcing a use case. Did I miss an elegant  
solution \_with\_ ansible?

/Benjamin

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Brian\_Coca](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/6de8d8/32.png) [@Brian\_Coca](https://forum.ansible.com/u/Brian_Coca)\
**Post date:** [February 20, 2016, 5:55pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/installl-a-bebian-8-1-from-a-computer-to-anpther-computer/20638/5 "2016-02-20T17:55:40Z")

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No, and I don’t think Ansible should really not do this itself. It should use other existing tools to do this that already are ‘good’ at it.

There are no current modules that help you with this aside from shell.