create a very specialised interface sugarcrm

I need a very specialized CRM

Do I

1. I want to recode the entire layout of sugar crm. whats the best way to start.
2. write a separate ap开发者_如何学运维plication and update SugarCRM via API calls

Can you be more specific about "very specialized CRM" ?

1.) You can customize all the field, drop down menus, layouts using the studio.

Check out:

http://developers.sugarcrm.com/docs/OS/6.1/-docs-Developer_Guides-Sugar_Developer_Guide_6.1.0-Chapter%204%20Customizing%20Sugar.html

Since you have decided to use SugarCRM don't develop UI outside SugarCRM. Since SugarCRM is very extensible and basicly every view in it can be replaced with any smarty tempalte/html page then there is no reason not to use it's functionalities especialy something like privilidges, home dashboards etc.

So my answer is go with SugarCRM customization.

If you are looking to re-write the whole MVC architecture of Sugar, I would write your own system based off a PHP MVC framework like Zend or CakePHP, if you are just looking to create specialized fields, and maybe tweak some layouts or something, I would recommend SugarCRM, because created fields and adding them to a basic 2 column form layout is quite simple. Even extending the current views is pretty easy if you have a solid grasp of OOPHP and the MVC architecture. Without knowing all your needs here, I'd be very surprised if you had to write a whole custom system. Almost Everything can be extended and customized in an upgrade safe way, which leaves you open to gaining the benefits of the new SugarCRM releases when they come out with out losing your custom enhancements.