How to transfer a remote linux server to another machine?

Question

Debian

Good afternoon,
what is the best way to transfer a remote debian server to a physical machine on your local network or to a vmware virtual machine?
- the option with dd is not suitable, because it is required to exclude some folders, and the configurations of the machines will be different
- I didn’t figure it out a bit with SystemImager, and I got the impression that it’s not for a one-time transfer, but more for online synchronization
- I’m considering the option of creating a file system archive in tgz or transferring directly via rsync - but you need instructions on what exactly to transfer, what to do with setting the same uid / guid, fstab and other things?
- the ideal solution would be the ability to create a system image the way acronis can do it, and then download it and deploy it via universal restore to any machine or convert it into a virtual machine image - but I didn’t find anything similar, and there’s no way to download custom ISO remotely ...
Who has any experience and thoughts?

Answer 1

Well, at least they looked: habrahabr.ru/qa/39805/
In a nutshell:
Either rsync or tar.
With the subsequent installation of grub on the target server.

Answer 2

Starting point for Google searches: "rsync numeric-ids exclude /proc /sys /dev"
You will also find here:
habrahabr.ru/post/119972/
"Migration from one physical server to another"
... etc.

Answer 3

yes, in general, get a list of packages, deploy them on the target machine and copy /etc to the same place.