For instances, I played around with the state machine module. It is a pretty cool idea. To be honest the multiple forms do not do it justice. It could really benefit from an interface similar to Yahoo! Pipes.

Here I am complaining with out offering a solution. So, my really basic solution would be for a Drupal Advance UI API.

In addition to sets of users and content elements, I realized there also needs to be sets of sets. I do not mean sets which are the union or intersection of other sets. I mean sets where the elements are sets themselves. It is a useful way to organize information.

Take an online forum as an example. If we start at the top, there is the forum which contains area’s of topics. Then each area of topic has sub area of topics. Within each sub area of topic, there is a collection of forum threads. And finally, each forum thread is a collection of posts (after the first one they are commonly known as replies).

The forum can be described as sets. I will start at the bottom and work my way up. At the very bottom is a forum post which is a content element with attributes for the title, body, author, and date.
post := [title, body, author, date]

Moving on up, next we have the forum thread which is a collection of posts. This thread set also has attributes itself which is the title.
thread := {post1…postn}[title]
In expanded form:
thread := {[title, body, author, date]1…post[title, body, author, date]n}[title]

Going up another step we have are first set of sets; the sub area of topic is a set of forum threads that are collections of posts.
sub area of topic := {thread1…threadn}[title]
In expanded form:
sub area of topic := {{[title, body, author, date]1…post[title, body, author, date]n}[title]1…{[title, body, author, date]1…post[title, body, author, date]n}[title]n}[title]

Moving on up, we have areas of topics which are sets of sub areas of topics which is a set of sets of sets.
area of topic := {sub area of topic1…sub area of topicn}[title]
In expanded form:
area of topic := {{{[title, body, author, date]1…post[title, body, author, date]n}[title]1…{[title, body, author, date]1…post[title, body, author, date]n}[title]n}[title]1…{{[title, body, author, date]1…post[title, body, author, date]n}[title]1…{[title, body, author, date]1…post[title, body, author, date]n}[title]n}[title]n}[title]

Finally, the forum itself is a set of areas of topics which gives us a set of sets of sets of sets.
forum := {area of topic1…area of topicn}[title]
In expanded form:
forum := {{{{[title, body, author, date]1…post[title, body, author, date]n}[title]1…{[title, body, author, date]1…post[title, body, author, date]n}[title]n}[title]1…{{[title, body, author, date]1…post[title, body, author, date]n}[title]1…{[title, body, author, date]1…post[title, body, author, date]n}[title]n}[title]n}[title]1…{{{[title, body, author, date]1…post[title, body, author, date]n}[title]1…{[title, body, author, date]1…post[title, body, author, date]n}[title]n}[title]1…{{[title, body, author, date]1…post[title, body, author, date]n}[title]1…{[title, body, author, date]1…post[title, body, author, date]n}[title]n}[title]n}[title]n}[title]

There is my thought which is sets of sets. Also, the introduction of my thought that sets can also have attributes.

What is a set?

In a generic meaning, a set is a collection of stuff. The items, aka the stuff, which make up a set are known as elements.

Lets create some examples of sets relating to a CMS:

• a group of users who live in Baltimore
• a group of users who I am friends with
• a collection of posts authored by Jimmy
• a collection of pages published in the year 2006
• a group of users who live in New York, joined since 2005, and authored a blog post

The Two Contexts for Sets in a CMS

Group

A group is a set of CMS users.

Content Collection

A content collection is a set of CMS content elements such as blog posts, articles, videos, brochures, etc.

The Types of Sets in a CMS

Before the describing the types of sets, lets create a small sample of users and content elements for a fictitious and simple CMS.

Users

Content Elements

Selective Set / Selective Group / Selective Collection

A selective set is a set of arbitrary elements. In essences, the administrator gets to pick whatever elements the administrator pleases to be in the set. For example, a group of my friends:
My Friends := {Joe, Sue, Ted}
For another example, a collection of my favorite blog posts:
My Favorite Blog Posts := {Best Food}

Organic Set / Organic Group / Organic Collection

An organic set is a set of elements which share the same value for an attribute. An example in our fictitious CMS is a group of people who live in PA which is a collection of users with the state attribute equal to PA:
PA users := {userstate = PA}
or
userstate = PA ∈ PA users = {Tom, Sue}
Another example is all content elements which are blog posts:
Content ElementContent Type = ‘Blog Post’ ∈ Blog posts = {Best Food, PHP FAQs}

Syntheses Set / Syntheses Group / Syntheses Collection

After selective sets and organic sets, everything else is a syntheses set. A syntheses set is a set with conditions on which elements belong to the set.

The first type of syntheses set, an Attribute Test Syntheses Set, is a set where the set’s elements have an attribute which passes a test:
test(Eattribute) = true ∈ Attribute Test Syntheses Set
For example of an attribute test syntheses group, a group of users who joined after 2005:
userJoin Year > 2005 ∈ Users who joined after 2005 = {Joe, Tom Sue, Pam}

The second type of syntheses set, a Join Syntheses Set, is where two or more selective, organic, or attribute test syntheses set are joined together. They can be joined together via union, intersection, subtraction, or exclusivity.

A common example is a group of people who live in the same city. Now it my seem like an organic group but remember cities names are not unique. They are repeated in different states and countries. To create a group users who live in Cherrywood VA, it is formed taking users who are in the organic group of userCity = Cherrywood and userState = VA which is an intersection of the two groups:
userCity = Cherrywood ∩ userState = VA ∈ Users who live in Cherrywood VA

Another example is my male friends which is the intersection of an organic group and a selective group:
{Joe, Sue, Ted} ∩ userSex = M ∈ My male friends

So here is this bit and if you have questions please ask because I tried to do an overview of my idea. Hopefully soon I will write some of my other thoughts regarding CMSs.