Ask HN: Advice on non-profits

I've been working on a software project that's essentially researching possible solutions for a good cause, and I'm at the stage where I'm ready to do some much larger-scale testing of my ideas and get a bit more publicity - maybe attract some other volunteers to develop and test, and if I'm lucky, get some funding. I need to buy some resources like servers, etc... and get volunteers to help with some testing. I'd also like to be able to accept donations if anyone's willing (even though I'm prepared to fund this myself), but I seriously doubt it will ever grow into anything more than a few employees.

Having said that, I would really like to set up a legal entity to manage the project so that things like hosting and domains can be set up in the name of the project, etc... I'd also like to be able to make a clear distinction when it comes to taxes, etc... what is "my money", and what is money that I gave to the organization, etc...

I'm thinking of setting up a non-profit, but I'm quite ignorant of that aspect of business, and I've been having a hard time finding any good resources. So while I keep looking, I thought I'd ask for any comments from the community. Does a non-profit sound like it's actually what I need? Is there a specific type I should look into considering the purpose and size? Is there some gold-mind of information about forming a non-profit that's been evading me somehow?

Any feedback you can provide would be very useful and much appreciated.

edit: if it makes a difference, this will be in Utah, and the software is basically a platform for researching different ways law enforcement could cooperate with the community, while promoting openness and preserving confidentiality where necessary. It started as a project just for fun and learning, but it's turned out to be potentially useful.