The ref-* files are used by checkchroot to find unwanted packages in the chroots. # cp ref-* /usr/local/chroot/ - stable-old is potato - stable is woody - different for diff arches - you can basically get the list using something like: grep-available -F priority -e -s package "(required|standard)" $CHROOT/var/lib/dpkg/available| \ awk '{print $2}'|sort - the only extras should be: apt build-essential fakeroot (some arches only use sudo and change $fakeroot config item) ssmtp sudo