cd /tmp/
# 14.10: $ wget http://old-releases.ubuntu.com/releases/utopic/ubuntu-14.10-desktop-amd64.manifest
# 16.04.2: $ wget http://releases.ubuntu.com/releases/xenial/ubuntu-16.04.2-desktop-amd64.manifest
# for 16.10:
wget http://releases.ubuntu.com/releases/16.10/ubuntu-16.10-desktop-amd64.manifest
     -q -O - | cut -f 1 > packages.manifest.list
# compare it with the list generated by
dpkg --get-selections  | cut -f 1 > packages.installed.list
# from moreutils you can use combine:
combine packages.manifest.list not packages.installed.list > packages.diff.list

wget http://releases.ubuntu.com/utopic/ubuntu-14.10-desktop-i386.manifest -q -O - | cut -f 1 > packages.manifest.list

IGNORE="language-pack|ubiquity|linux-|locale-|spell-|-help-|hyphen-|l10n|wbrazilian|wfrench|witalian|wportuguese|wspanish|mythes-"
cat packages.diff.list |egrep -v '('$IGNORE')' |less