Start a development team for Linux?

[dmphotography]

Hey everyone,
First off, I want to apologize to any forum moderator or admin that thinks I'm cross-posting or double posting, as I made a thread like this in the Windows section.
I'm trying to develop for both Linux and Windows, so I thought it was appropriate to make a thread in each section, as I'm sure someone only interested in Linux won't be viewing Windows and visa versa.

I want to begin by saying I'm a newbie to having my own web server and I've found it very challenging at times in installing and configuring different aspects of it.
I first started off trying to install each component such as MySQL, PHP5, and the other components XAMPP does automatically and just couldn't get phpmyadmin to work.
Then I discovered XAMPP. Wow, what a breeze that's made the setup and install process!

After I succeeded at installing it and getting my own phpBB forum up and going, I grew increasingly curious on learning more and trying other addons and configurations. I've learned there are many challenges and complications one will encounter depending on so many variables such as if their server is installed on a Windows or Linux server etc. The problem I've found is most of the information you'll find are either vague tutorials or partial threads only resolving one issue a person is stuck on, like many of the threads here. For example, "I can't reach my web pages via my IP".

That got me thinking, why not make a website dedicated to helping people start their own web server and adding on things such as forums, blogs, and other script addons? And I don't mean another support forum like this, because this one works great and there are several others that also do the same. Instead, make one that is complete with notes and tutorials that thoroughly explains the process of installing and configuring the components and try to make a very thorough troubleshooting guide for problems encountered during setting up and installing them that a complete newbie can follow and manage to get working without advanced programming knowledge.

I don't really intend on supporting anything like "OMG, I deleted MySQL and when I try to reinstall, it won't work!". Those types of scenarios are for this forum. My goal is to walk someone through successfully installing and setting it up to get it running. If they mess it up beyond that, then that's their issue.

I'm using VMware workstation to install and configure the different OS's and then installing XAMPP on them and doing my testing that way so multi-platform testing is very easy to manage.
I'm currently learning how to install and configure XAMPP in Linux using Ubuntu 8.10 as the OS and it's very challenging due to my limited knowledge of how Linux is structured and functions compared to my familiarity with doing things in Windows.

I didn't really know where to go to find others willing to help make, develop, and troubleshoot installations for the tutorials and I figured this place was probably the best since everything I'm doing is based off an XAMPP install. I greatly appreciate any help anyone is willing to give to this project, whether it be just assisting in troubleshooting or writing full tutorials themselves.

I believe by forming a team, it'd be much easier to solve the problems encountered and be quicker than just posting to a forum and waiting for others to respond. I'm somewhat limited on my knowledge and understanding of PHP and configuration issues, but I have managed to overcome several challenges and think this would be much more efficient to have others on-board for the challenge.

If you're interested, you can contact me via email at imchillindave@hotmail.com or my website I'm posting my work to, which for now is located at http://www.imgoingtoreportyou.com .

Thank you in advance!


Dave