TYPO3 + Magento + SugarCRM + Alfresco: An Enterprise Integrated Platform

TYPO3 + Magento + SugarCRM + Alfresco
An Enterprise Integrated Platform
30/10/2013 – T3CON13DE Stuttgard

Mauro Lorenzutti
CTO at
www.webformat.com
TYPO3 developer & consultant
since 2004
Main developer of
“DB Integration” (extkey: wfqbe)

Let’s start with a question…

What does
Enterprise
Software
mean
for you?

A software that
covers all my
business needs!

Image from http://www.tecnocino.it/2006/08/articolo/wenger-knife/2433/

Ok, you can do almost
everything with that.
But is it the best tool to…

Cut eggplants?
Image from http://www.pianetamamma.it/network/ricette-nonna/maccheroni-alle-melanzane-e-scamorza.html

Wouldn’t you prefer this knife?
Image from http://www.mercurycut.it/it/product/219/coltello_da_cucina_cm20.html

Assemble furniture?
Image from http://www.ikea.it

Wouldn’t you prefer this screwdriver?
Image from http://www.melchioni.it/catalogo-megastore/articolo/495110428/

Can you save a nuclear plant with
that Swiss Knife?
Image from http://libertariancrier.com/insider-reveals-san-diego-nuclear-plant-is-to-dangerous/

Of
course!
Image from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lqtJXzzvC8o

Ok…
Bad example…
Go back to the
original question!

From Wikipedia:
Enterprise software describes a collection of computer
programs with common business applications, tools for
modeling how the entire organization works, and development
tools for building applications unique to the organization.
The software is intended to solve an enterprise-wide problem,
rather than a departmental problem.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enterprise_software

Some words are
really interesting!

Enterprise software describes a collection of computer
programs with common business applications, […]

The software is intended to solve an enterprise-wide problem,
rather than a departmental problem.

Is TYPO3 powerful enough to
solve an enterprise-wide
problem, rather than a
departmental one?

Let’s try to identify some common
needs of big companies

Just to be simple, a company
usually needs:
• A nice website to
promote its business
• An e-commerce to
sell goods
• A way to collect and
analyze customers data
• An intranet to internally
share news and knowledge
• A tool to store and
manage documents
• A tool to create a
marketing campaign
• And much more…

Is TYPO3 the right solution?

Obviously it is !!!

• An e-commerce to sell goods

Why not?
TYPO3 has a lot of ecommerce plugins:
 TT_products
 Commerce
 Extendedshop
 Multishop
 Wt_cart
 Trade Ecommerce System
And many others…

But are those plugins ready to
satisfy big e-commerce needs?
• Multi-language,
multi-currency,
multi-store
• Simple, configurable,
boundle, virtual and
downloadable products
• Custom attributes • Stock management
• A lot of payment gateways
and shipping integrations
• Easy to integrate
with ERPs

There are a lot of platforms whose
specific scope is e-commerce:
OS Commerce, PrestaShop,
Magento, Zen Cart, Shopify, …

•Open source ecommerce platform
•Based on Zend Framework
•Leader platform in the market
www.magentocommerce.com
•Downloaded more then 3M times
•Translated in 60 languages
•More than 1M registered users

System
• Layered navigation
• Wishlist
• Products comparison
• Orders history
• Advanced search
• …
Marketing
• Multi-site, multi-language,
multi-currency
• Products, orders, shippings
and invoices management
• Stock management
• A lot of payment gateways
and shipping services
integrated
• Over 4000 plugins available
• …
Customers
• SEO ready
• Upselling and Cross-selling
• Gift certificates
• Promotions engine
• Abandoned cart management
• A lot of reports
• …

Ok, companies need a powerful
ecommerce platform like

• A way to collect and
analyze customers data
• A tool to create a
marketing campaign

specific scope is CRM:
SugarCRM, Sales Force, Nimble,
vTiger, Zoho CRM, …

Open source CRM platform
Based on PHP / Mysql
Integrated with many softwares
www.sugarcrm.com

Marketing
• Sharing customer
information
• Opportunity oriented
• Commercial agents efficient
improvements
• Offers monitoring
• …
Customer care
• Multi-channel campaigns
management
• ROI measurement
• Real-time reports
• …
Sales
• Information centralized
• Email integration
• Knowledge base
• Issue tracking
• Asterisk integration
•…

CRM platform like

• A tool to store and
manage documents

Why not?
TYPO3 has two great assets management plugins:
TYPO3 4.x
 DAM
TYPO3 6.x
 FAL
 Media

But are those plugins ready to satisfy
complex documents managements?
• ACL • Versioning
• Full-text search • Custom metadata
• Metadata extractors • Checkin / Checkout
• Secure downloads • Integrated workflow engine
• Automatic documents
conversion
• Easy integration with
other tools

Some features are
covered, but what
about the others?

specific scope is document management:
Documentum, MS Sharepoint,
Knowledge Tree, Alfresco, …

Open source Document management platform
Based on Java technology
Integrated with MS Office, Google Drive, iWork, …
www.alfresco.com

Collaboration
• MS Office integration
• Checkin / Checkout
• Metadata extractors
• Fulltext search
• …
System
• Versioning
• ACL
• Integrated Workflow
engine
• Secure downloads
• Document associations
• …
Users
• CMIS support
• CIFS support
• Documents and folders
rule engine
• Easy integration
•…

document management platform like

So, is TYPO3 powerful enough to
solve an enterprise-wide
problem, rather than a
departmental one?

There are other platforms that are a
better choice to satisfy specific needs
Content Management Framework
E-commerce Platform
Customer Relationship Management
Document Management Platform

2. Integrate the other platforms
1. Improve TYPO3
We have two possibilities:

Let’s Improve TYPO3!
Can we compete
with Magento for ecommerce?
with Alfresco for DM?
with Sugar for CRM?

Have you ever heard about
re-inventing the wheel?
Image from http://revolveapp.com

What about integrating them?
Would it be a right approach?

“Good programmers know what to write.
Great ones know what to rewrite (and reuse).”
(Eric S. Raymond)

Ok, tell me about your integration!

Let’s analyze integrations in pairs!

• Goal:
• To integrate advanced e-commerce features in a TYPO3 website
• Functionalities integrated:
• Single-Sign-On
• Products in TYPO3 pages
• TYPO3 contents in Magento pages
• Products management in TYPO3 backend
• Same layout, user doesn’t feel the transition between the two systems

Magento
products,
categories and
blocks inclusion as
TYPO3 content
elements
Magento products management in a TYPO3 backend module:

A small advertisement
Tomorrow I’m going to speak about the TYPO3 and
Magento integration to manage the Panini stickers
ecommerce!

• Goal:
• To use Alfresco as asset management for TYPO3
• Documents navigation, upload, edit and search in TYPO3 frontend
• Not ready yet:
• Alfresco as FAL repository

• Goal:
• To use Alfresco as asset management for Magento
• Orders confirmation, invoices and shipping documents are stored in Alfresco
• Documents associated to products are stored in Alfresco
• Customer documents secure download from Alfresco

TYPO3 + Magento + SugarCRM + Alfresco: An Enterprise Integrated Platform

• Goal:
• Collect user data from a TYPO3 website into SugarCRM
• TYPO3 Users synchronized with SugarCRM contacts
• Leads creation in SugaCRM for TYPO3 powermail contacts
• Surveys data collection from TYPO3 (pbsurvey) into SugarCRM

• Goal:
• To use Alfresco as asset management for SugarCRM
• Contacts, leads and companies documents stored in Alfresco
• Notes stored as Alfresco documents
• Templates stored in Alfresco and used to documents with contacts data
automatically filled in

• Goal:
• Collect user data from a Magento e-commerce into SugarCRM
• Magento customers synchronized with SugarCRM contacts
• Orders, invoices, shippings imported in SugarCRM and associated to contacts
• Recently viewed products, products in cart and in wishlist and abbandoned
carts imported in SugarCRM and associated to contacts
• Data collected can be used to filter contacts while creating a marketing
campaign

Alfresco is used as a shared document
repository for the other platforms

SugarCRM collects users data from
both TYPO3 and Magento
and provides tools to use that data
E.g. you can create a marketing campaign suggesting a new
smartphone to all users who have an older version in the wishlist
and have answered that they are going to change their smartphone
in a few months in a poll

Easy and effective content management
thanks to TYPO3
and advanced e-commerce features
thanks to Magento

Mmmhh, how did you achieve this?

Two integration principes:
1. Direct API calls
2. Messages exchange
through a BUS

Direct API calls
PRO: Useful when realtime data sharing is needed
CON: Creates a strong dependence between the
integrated software
Examples:
• Document uploads into Alfresco (based on CMIS)
• Magento products shown in TYPO3 pages (based
on Magento APIs)
• TYPO3 contents shown in Magento pages (based
on TYPO3 typeNum concept)
• …

Messages exchange
PRO: Useful when information has to be
broadcasted to more than one software,
more scalable
CON: Delay in information exchange
Example:
• Customer data from TYPO3 and Magento to
SugarCRM

How we achieved this integration:
A BUS manages information broadcasting thanks
to a message queue
An Identity Management takes care about SSO
and users profiles
A single panel to manage backend users for all the
softwares
An interface for realtime monitoring the BUS and the
Identity Management

Hey, is a television that
in the lower right?

TYPO3 and Magento as
multichannel content providers
JSON / XML
HTML
SOAP
SOAP

Concept can be extended to third-
party softwares for other needs
E.g. we usually integrate ERPs
or substitute SugarCRM with other CRMs

It was not easy…
A lot of work remains to be done!

A small complain with TYPO3
It doesn’t expose any Web Service or REST API

Q & A
mauro.lorenzutti@webformat.com
http://it.linkedin.com/in/maurolorenzutti
https://twitter.com/MauroLorenzutti
http://www.slideshare.net/mauro.lorenzutti

TYPO3 + Magento + SugarCRM + Alfresco: An Enterprise Integrated Platform

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