Snippets

Add a user useradd -g $usr_group -m $usr_name

Add basic packages

#!/bin/sh
LIST_OF_APPS="a b c d e"

aptitude update
aptitude install -y $LIST_OF_APPS

Or better?

apt-get update

for package in LIST_OF_APPS
do
    apt-get install -qq --print-uris $package >> script.log 2>>script_error.log
done