Questions[multi-platform](server)

I am trying to setup a simple cross platform server that would be completely portable and work on windows, mac and linux.

Some Background: I used to only have a windows desktop. This desktop has ran xampp to power some php scripts that are an interface to a database. Recently I got a macbook pro and have been wanting to work the database locally but putting it on a server is out of the question as i frequently use my laptop where there is no internet connection. I was thinking that i could put the database on a usb drive and just use different binaries depending on the system i was working on.

Im looking around I've seen several posts about similar things but there seems to be issues (which i have run into) with xampp for mac being hardcoded to run out of /Applications and refuses to run from /Volumes/USB (the usb stick mount point). Further more, no one has directly addressed the issues that im sure ill run into with having multiple binaries using the same database.

Id like to here what you all think would be the best soluion for this. I think that I may need to go in another direction but am not sure where.

Note: Ive already tried doning a virtual machine saved on the usb drive but it took several minutes to boot and performance is slow.

I currently admin a small variety of Mac's at work. We have some G3/G4/G5/MBP/iBook/eMac/iMac. I've noticed that each system is configured slightly different and wanted to come up with some disk images of full installations pre-configured.

I would install the OS and non licensed software, custom scripts, and configuration. Then take a snapshot image of the drive and save it to an external.

In a nutshell, what I need to know is how many different images I am going to need.

• Is this a horrible idea, and I should just reinstall on a per-computer basis?

• Can I have a single images for all the G5's, another for the G4's, another for the G3's, etc?

• Can I have an OS specific image that works across all machines? i.e: Tiger/PPC and Leopard/Intel

I would like to do this with as few images as possible, for maintenance reasons, but I understand there may be some underlying issues that would cause this not to work.

The installations will be done with Retail disks aswell, and not model specific disks if that matters at all. If anyone can shed some light on what some options for this would be, it would be greatly appreciated.

I would like to install 2 completely independent instances of Windows XP (no data should be shared) in my computer within 2 different primary partitions. I know that grub can handle booting them correctly, but I have no idea if it's possible to install it and configure it within a 100% NTFS system and without any extra linux partition/distribution.

Considering that it would have been laughed at by the unix/linux people to suggest windows as a internet connected server until the 2000 era, is that argument now laid to rest?

Aside from nix admins who dont want to lose their lucrative admin positions(because certain jobs take ages compared to windows, and vice versa) is there any reason ASIDE FROM COST, that linux is more secure after a professional has setup windows?

Considering the performance of modern hardware, I believe now that the tools and ease of use of windows platform make it an equally viable server platform.

Unless you require Open source technology that are ideally deployed on Linux, I see no reason for people to roll their eyes at windows, or ignore it as a viable platform.

What do you think?

Please provide examples of how this can be setup on client and server versions of various operating systems.