If you just want the same programs on your laptop and desktop, use something like dpkg --get-selections and dpkg --set-selections (for APT, I’m sure RPMland has an analogue). If you also want the same configuration, copy over your homedir or the dotfiles therein and be happy.
Futhermore, testing n distros is not really my definition of ‘work the first time’, nor can you expect that what worked a year ago still works two releases later.
Your point about 100 desktops in a work environment also strikes me as slightly odd, given that I would consider using Puppet, Chef or possibly NFS mounts (depending on the exact setup) rather than configuring/installing 100 desktops individually.
As far as same programs, I would still have to load them the first time and know what to look for. So in addition to stuff I need for work (e.g. LAMP stack), I would have to Google around (more than once) for stuff that I know comes with other distros (example of slight annoyance: vim vs. vim-tiny: thanks, Ubuntu). It's just a little bit less work.
But the beauty of Linux is that we can make these choices willfully :)
Futhermore, testing n distros is not really my definition of ‘work the first time’, nor can you expect that what worked a year ago still works two releases later.
Your point about 100 desktops in a work environment also strikes me as slightly odd, given that I would consider using Puppet, Chef or possibly NFS mounts (depending on the exact setup) rather than configuring/installing 100 desktops individually.