Martin Steigerwald wrote:
[SNIP]This only works if the only customization is in /etc and ~. But unfortunately I sometimes need to use software which is not available in the Debian repositories and therefore also had some binary applications which needed to be transferred.Okay, for this, if possible I indeed suggest packaging them. For some easy peasy initial packaging check-install may help.
It appears that should be CheckInstall, see: http://manpages.debian.net/cgi-bin/man.cgi?query=checkinstall and/or http://wiki.debian.org/CheckInstall