Sacrificial Linux boxes

[Jonathan Hutchins]

I used to consider my workstation the "sacrificial", "sandbox", or "lab" 
machine, especially when I mostly ran in Windows(95) on it and only booted to 
Linux to experiment.  (The GUI would be too resource intensive and I'd go 
back to Windows.)

A while back though, I set up a "test machine" in the basement so I could 
familiarise myself with Gentoo linux while not loosing too much productivity 
as I came to be more reliant on the connectivity of the now Linux-dominant 
workstation.  The closest thing to an "essential" service that it provides is 
off-site access to my email (Squirrelmail on Apache), and I can usually elect 
not to do anything fatal to the box prior to when I might really need that 
access.