With a gallion forums here, it was difficult to find the right one to post to, so I've plumped for General. Apologies if there was a more appropriate forurm, but I just couldn't see it.

Anyway, I have a newbie question. I am specifying a system to manage a new financial service. I am not so interested in making sales, as I am managing the service for companies that have already applied and subscribe to the service.

The data I need to store for this service, I suspect, would need database tables of its own. The rules for the service, defining how it runs, would need its won custom code. I would ideally like all this integrated into Sugar, so that I can take advantage of the client management, workflow, logs, user interface etc. already built for the purpose.

What I think I need, is a custom module that sits in Sugar under another top tab or two, providing custom screens and custom functionality. It will also need to send out invoices, generate files for BACS/CHAPS and receive Direct Debit notifcations, as well as interface to an accounting package to keep its ledger up-to-date. There is a self-service aspect to this service I'm designing, but that self-service would be linked almost entirely to my custom code.

Does Sugar lend itself to these kinds of add-on 'modules' (if such a concept exists)? Would I be better building an external application to manage the services, and interface it to Sugar in some other way? Is sugar so focused on sales that it would not be easily extended to support a service like this?

-- Jason