I'm pretty new to this sort of thing--but not to electronics.
I have a problem. How does one clone the firmware/fuses/whatever, in a chip--onto another blank chip, to make it identical to the original?
What would I need to get to make this happen?
I have some completely blank chips and a programmed and working chip,--nothing else yet, except a bare-bones board.
Get to know to avrdude.
You need a programmer, for example USBasp or and Arduino as ISP.
See this site for the fuses: http://www.engbedded.com/fusecalc
Use a few blank chips and write the EEPROM and flash and fuses, and try to read them back.
You have to know what to fuses do, since they can prevent further communication.
Once you know all that, read the programmed chip and try to copy that into another chip.
Look at Nick Gammon's site as well, for reading out fuses so you know how to set them among other things.