Integration questions

[wonko]

Hi,

I have been asked to integrate a forum in a existing site. I looked around a little, and SMF seemed like a good choice. However, I have some remaining questions:

- Most important question: there is already a existing user login system, which gives access to certain area's and it should be preserved. The system is a simple table with users/passes (MD5), and a value in the session which gives the username when logged in. Every user who has an account should be able to use this account automagically to use the forum (post...). I thought about searching the login checking code in SMF, and adapting these functions, but maybe there is a better way. A quick glance in this forum gave the impression that everybody uses the login system of SMF to grant access to other areas on sites. I want to do it the other way around (SMF depends on the sites login system). I looked through the SSI, and the Integration in the 1.1RC version, but documentation is hard to find, as are good examples. I guess I need the integration options in 1.1RC...

- I want to disable certain parts of SMF (the newsbox, the "profile" of users...) as all of this is already present in the current site. Is there a better way beside cutting all the code from the templates (as this will not disable this code in the SMF source, and the queries to the DB will be made, but never used)?

- Is there a better option to integrate the header/footer in the template, beside cutting everything away, and replacing it with all the code/queries to make the header/footer. (I guess not)...

I'm not expecting code examples, or fully working answers. Just pointers in the good direction or threads that might help are also more than welcome...

Rgds,