Not sure I understand benefit of integration

[reikimaster]

I have a portal system (Mambo) that is completely public viewable. Users don't need to log in.
I will be using SMF message boards
I would like to have Coppermine available as well.

These will all be fresh installs with no users or content to start so I don't have to worry about migrating users or pictures or anything.

I will NOT be integrating SMF into Mambo. I see no purpose since users don't have to log in to use the portal.
What would the benefit be of integrating Coppermine with SMF besides the obvious fact that they can share a user database?

Is that the ONLY benefit?
If the bridge is in place would a forum user be able to post a link that goes DIRECTLY to their gallery in Coppermine? A certain picture within their gallery? ( I would think with a publicly viewable gallery this would be possible with or without the bridge)
Does the bridge just give users the ability to log in to the forums then open Coppermine and be able to upload pictures?

I'm really trying to figure out how I want to structure things. My site is non-commercial. Not a ton of traffic.

Besides the "neat-o" factor of bridging SMF and Coppermine... what do I really gain?

Not trying to be flip or anything. I'm just trying to understand why it would be necessary for me to bridge these 2 items.

Appreciate any help or thoughts on the subject.

[Joachim Müller]

this board you're on uses smf and cpg bridged. All features you can see on this page and the demo are all there is (although we don't allow user uploads on the demo for bandwidth reasons). As far as I understand there is little point for you to use integration, although you have to bear in mind that you might later find out that anonymous users might be causing problems both on your board and coppermine (posting crap of any kind), so you might want to use integration later. Please understand that you will lose all corelation between users and their pics when doing integration once pics already exist in coppermine.

Joachim

[reikimaster]

I would require people to log in if they want to post on the message boards. I will probably let them browse the message boards as guests, but to post anything they'd have to register. I've noticed this as an SMF forum and walked through the demo looking at the integration. My current feeling is that I don't need integration with my PORTAL , but if I even THINK that integration between Coppermine and SMF would be helpful, I am much better off doing the bridge when I first install both and they are clean.

That sound about right? 

And what I'm really getting out of this is the fact that when people log in to the message board, they are also logging in to Coppermine.

In Coppermine... will I still be able to limit who can upload pictures and stuff? I mean... I don't want ALL registered people to be able to create galleries and upload pics.
What would be IDEAL is if I could put them in 2 groups simultaneously in SMF (I haven't looked at this yet) so tehy could be registered with SMF and then ALSO be in a CPG group that would give them rights in CPG. Or something. Now I'm getting confused.

If the user info after teh bridge... is coming from SMF... then how much user control do you still have in Coppermine?

[Nibbler]

Why don't you just try it and see ?