Categories of access and lifecycle patterns

One thing I started to think about during today's call, and that I would like to see is some language that defines certain categories of access and lifecycle patterns of metadata resources.

For example, an ACL resource has certain properties in that acl:Control applies to it, it is tied to the lifecycle of its resource, it has certain atomicity expectations, etc. An image, OTOH, has a metadata resource which is tied to it, but different permissions; a configuration metadata resource isn't necessarily tied to the lifecycle of its resource.

I think this boils down to a handful of orthogonal categories, and it seems to me that the spec would be clearer if we could define metadata resource types in terms of a few such categories, rather than having a sentence of prose for each.

This was also the motivation behind my tongue-in-cheek subatomic physics mental model, and I would like to see it made instrumental to improve the spec.

Start by reading the discussion linked from issue 120 and the existing specification language about metadata resources. Identify the proposed orthogonal categories for access, lifecycle, permissions, and atomicity, then determine whether the specification can define resource types consistently with them. Done means the categories and their application are agreed and incorporated into the specification.