[Cialug] Lots 'o questions....

[jrnosee at gmail.com]

I've decided to take on a new endeavor and I'm looking for any thoughts,
suggestions, tips, etc. I can get.

I'm going to set up a box running Ubuntu (not sure if it will be server (or
server w/ gui) or desktop yet).

This box is going to be 2 things.

1.) VMware Server
Currently this runs my NSLU2 "slug" embedded linux development environment.
I may also add a web/email server VM* (see below)
2.) Media File and Backup Server
I'm going to set up a mirrored 500GB raid to hold multi-media files and
backup files from my home windows pc's.

The OS will either be on a separate drive, or the same drive as the VM's.
The RAID will be a share as a whole (unless suggested differently).  I want
to make as much room available to this share as possible.

My primary questions involve the RAID as I've never set one up before.
There are 2 things I'm hoping the raid can do for me, but I don't know if it
can, or how to set it up.
1.) Pull 'n go in an emergency.  You know, the house is burning down and I
have time to grab...one drive tray from the server.  If I pull out one of
the two raid drives and my house goes up in flames, can I just stick the
drive in another computer later as a single drive and get my files back?
2.) Windows/Linux accessable.  I'm going to be sharing to a Windows PC.  I
want the linux OS to be able to read the drive too.  I'm going to have large
(4+GB) files on it and I know FAT32 won't go that big.  Should #1 happen, I
may want to get at these files from a Windows PC.

My other questions involves Security & VM's.
1.) If I open up a VM to the web for webhosting and email, are my other VM's
and my host OS still safe from attack?  Sadly for years I've pretty much sat
myself behind a router firewall and lived happily...I doubt that'll be
enough sooner than later.

Odd question out:
Going along with #2 from the RAID questions, is there any format I can use
on a portable drive that would store large (4+GB) files, and be readable and
writable in Linux and Windows?

Thanks,

Justin W. Richeson
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