nice question @paidforby_

Something not clearly written is that you can provide an ENV variable which starts you a different identity

app_name=mix_test_2 sbot server

this creates a new folder ~/.mix_test_2 in this case. Problem is this doesn't start the sbot on different ports, so it will collides with another running sbot.

@don did some work in a similar direction as you using docker : https://github.com/don-smith/ssb-tutorial which you might find interesting.
Nice accronym use it !