[TYPO3] Please help me estimate consequences and workload by integrating second DB

[Daniel Smedegaard Buus]

Hey guys, hope you're not getting too tired of my weird questions yet ;)

I'm at a point in my research where I'm considering the pros and cons of
separating the items for sale in an online bookstore from all other content
on the database level. The way that TYPO3 handles its data is simply
incompatible with the way the items database has to be layed out, plus it
has to run on MSSQL, and there are too many issues with TYPO3 and
extensions when it itself is running on MSSQL for that to be a valid
approach.

This means that the items database will no longer "be inside the TYPO3
realm". I will have to create my own management module separate from the
rest of the backend and integrate it as a module much like the way that
phpMyAdmin is integrated into the backend.

The idea would be to write "utility classes" if you will that would be
registered in TYPO3, and they would provide access to the data in the
separate database for the frontend extension I would later write (such as
search, browsing, viewing, etc.)

I'm just not quite able to estimate the impact that this will have on my
workload on one hand, and the loss of possibilities and availability of
usable API support functions on the other hand, when I'll be "taking the
data away" from TYPO3.

I have thoughts like,
* I'll have to implement my own authentication control and localization into
the backend administration module (which I'll also have to code from the
ground up)
* BE users won't have access to frontend editing of the separated content.
* Administering presentation of content on the website for a backend user
will only be possible through "content wrapping" plugins that can be placed
as content objects on pages (which of course, the data in the separated
database cannot)
* I will lose (or have to use much time on "hacking") cool API functions
such as image manipulation on images in the separated database.
* Integrating other extensions would force me to modify them more than what
is kosher in order to access the content from the separated database - for
example a forum extension with threads references items in the db, shopping
cart, indexed search (writing a hook somewhere to implement searching in
both the indexed TYPO3 content, and the content in the separated database)
* ... And a lot of other things. I fear in the long run that I'll have to
modify the TYPO3 core itself in order to fix some issue that I don't know
about right now. And that's not acceptable.

Can anyone comment on these? Or add other problems?

Is this just too far out to make sense using TYPO3 at all? Will I
be "circumventing" more than "implementing" in such a setup?

I really hope someone will comment on this post, as I feel the need to
decide drastically quite soon.

Thank you so much in advance for *any* input at all,
Daniel


-- 
http://www.rhesusb.dk