I currently have a magento store running on a dedicated server using varnish/turpentine and memecache
I would like to have the backend/admin run on its own server and am looking for some guidance on the steps I need to take to do this. particularly in regards to the mysql database.
My current understanding is that I need to have two identical installs with the same document root. and that all files and resources must stay synched. (rsync)
the memcache will be shared.
Do both installs reference the same database(one locally, the other remotely)? is it best to keep the database on the frontend machine or the backend machine?
are there any special considerations for sessions i will need to take as well?
If you do not want to install magento on two different location then you can share your web disk.In this way you do not need to worry about code synchronization.Otherwise you can have 2 different code which will share the same database.
On both servers,session should be save in database then only there will be no concern of the session. Yes,Memcache need to be shared.You should have database on frontend machine so that response time is fast.