>So there must be something in-between, to recreate a linux install elsewhere?

There's a class of tools like chef, ansible, puppet.

Or you can just package your services into debs and run a Debian repo to install them from, same as the base OS

Possibly there's something closer to dockerfiles out there by now as well

>btw, you can click on the time of the post, and reply there when there is no reply link in the main thread.

Cool, thanks!

Makes me puzzled about the point of concealing the reply links, I guess it just adds a bit of friction?

Using dedicated servers doesn't mean you're not using virtualization - it just means you're the one managing it. You control the hypervisor and the vms running on top of it. Because of that, you're actually less tied to a specific hosting provider since you're not reliant on their APIs to set up and manage your infrastructure.

Even if you're not using virtualization there are still plenty of ways to migrate your servers.

One of the most common approaches (which was the thing before docker took over) is managing servers with an IaC approach using tools like chef, puppet, ansible, saltstack etc.

With IaC you define your entire infrastructure in configuration files and deploy those configs to your host. It's a bit like docker swarm but for managing physical and/or virtual servers instead of containers.

Another popular option, often paired with IaC, is to create your own pre-configured *nix images tailored to your needs. For example, you might have specific images set up for your load balancers, db servers, file hosts, or other roles in your stack.

I've worked at a company where we handled migrations using dd. Technically that's also an option. Wouldn't recommend it tho.

If the server hoster supports it (Hetzner apparently does), you can enable KVM and install a previously prepared image. If the server hoster & hardware supports it, you can login remotely to the server management interface (like HP iLO) and install an image this way.

If you don't have above options or simply don't want to do it this way, you can also bootstrap via SSH. But instead of manually typing in shell commands, you will automate it in some way with custom scripts and/or tools like Ansible.

You can use a configuration manager like Puppet.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Puppet_(software)

Talos Linux, Flatcar Container linux...

Isn't a Docker image an OS image and a bunch of shell commands?

Imagine you'd set up your own server at home.

You'd buy a computer, plug an install USB drive in, and install ubuntu.

Then you'd connect to it via SSH, configure it, maybe install docker and set up your docker containers, etc.

A dedicated server is very similar.

The server is sitting in a datacenter at hetzner, and you usually install an OS with a button in the management UI, sure.

But everything afterwards is the same. You just connect via SSH, install docker or k8s and your services, maybe an nginx, etc.

You also have an option to request KVM access. That allows you to control the server as if you had connected a keyboard and monitor to it. You can even enter the BIOS to diagnose issues, if you'd like.

Personally I've got an install script that automates everything and sets up kubernetes and automated encrypted backups. Then I just deploy everything else with k8s.