You don't want anything to do with XP Home. It has a horrible IP Networking stack, with limited support for large networks. Go with XP Pro.
Also, the vast majority of what you say you'll be doing with this, you'll end up doing in the Mac. Forget Bootcamp, and get VMWare's Fusion. Here's why:
In Fusion, you can set up a Virtual Machine to run XP, using the settings you want. I've had great success with this config: Windows XP Pro, set to use a max of 40 GB hard drive (have it grow, don't allocate it all at once), 512 MB RAM, and 1 processor. Allow file sharing between the VMHost and the VMGuest. Over all, you end up with some major benefits:
One, you can write code in either system at the same time. I find that the compilers included with OS-X are better than those that most colleges use on XP/Vista. Thus, your troubleshooting will be easier.
Two, you can drag and drop files between OS-X and XP's desktops, without the pain of rebooting on a frequent basis. This is a major productivity boost by itself.
Three, if you use Time Machine, you'll always have a back up of your XP session. Time Machine will not back up an XP Partition. So, if you have a drive failure, you won't lose either XP or Mac data.
Four, if the system crash actually happens, you'll be able to bring the VMWare Fusion-based XP image up on any VMWare system of equivalent specs, regardless of base OS, and run it.
Finally, pay no attention to Windows users telling you it wont work the same on Mac. First , they are right: It works better. My XP Pro VM in Fusion outperforms the 3.0 GHz Hyper Threaded laptop that it replaced, using half the RAM.