Is Zen Cart able to integrate with any current open source ERP or POS solutions?
If not, is it able to communicate with such applications using web services? (example of this being how TinaPOS and OpenBravo can communicate at this page).
What I'm looking towards building is a "real" store as well as a web store, using the POS system in the store for physical purchases. The POS system will communicate with the ERP package, which will keep track of store inventory. I'd like to have Zen Cart be able to work with the same data.
It doesn't really matter to me if Zen talks to TinaPOS (which can talk to OpenBravo) or to OpenBravo directly, so long as the end result is a single location where I know the stock is canonical and makes sure that the web store doesn't present items that the real shop has sold.
Am I going off the deep end here? Are people using Zen Cart as a "real" store front-end too?
I'm doing 2 things with my planned business ... selling restaurant-style inventory (coffee, tea, snacks) as well as local artwork and services like renting out a small concert stage which also doubles as a meeting room/class room as well as some computer services. The food items and services are a replenishable commodity, so its not a big deal for tracking. But the artwork will be unique pieces, meaning I need to make sure I don't sell one in the shop and again online.
The restaurant-stuff could be run off TinaPOS while the artwork is sold separately using Zen Cart, but I'd really like to make the interfaces the same so that I can not confuse employees as much.
I'm not locked into any of these software packages at the moment, I'm starting from the bottom of the integration chain right now and just investigating software. But I want to make the best picks now for integration + future upgrades since I'll be my own support once its running.