A
system previously cloned with an
operating system and a collection of applications has personal configuration data customized for the user receiving the
system by a configuration tool. When the configuration tool is used in an interactive mode, a dialog displays the existing configuration and allows the installer or user to modify and save it. When the configuration tool is used in a non-interactive mode, that is, for migration, the
machine configuration information is obtained from or put to an
operating system independent configuration
data file without using the configuration dialog. In interactive mode, a user dialog is displayed with the
list of all the supported applications that are found to be installed on the
system. Selecting one of the listed applications brings up an application dialog including input fields for each of the configuration items for that application. Configuration data can be imported from or exported to the configuration
data file 160. This allows an installer to export from an old system and import into the new one when hardware is being upgraded. Also, the import and export feature is used to automate configuration and information gathering.