Access control

A common pattern in system design is that X can only happen if Y is true.

• A user can only access their account settings if logged in.
• A piece of data can only be accessed if its mutex is locked.
• A file can only be read if a user has read permissions.

These properties are all instances of access control, where the ability to execute an action is predicated on access privileges.

In terms of our representational principle, the two conceptual elements are the action (eg opening a webpage, reading data) and the access (logged in, locked a mutex). We will look at how to design APIs to ensure consistency between the action and the access.