Afternoon all,

I have created a diagram (attached) of what I think the absolute minimum core states need to be... essentially boiling them down to "STOPPED" and "ACTIVE" with "START" and "STOP" being the only requisite actuators. Transitional "STOPPING" and "STARTING" states are optional.

I believe states should be completely unambiguous so I don't particularly like the DMTF model ("stopped" and "active" machines are also "defined" but this is a separate state) and that also rules out vague terminology like "inactive" (which could mean both "stopped" and "suspended").

I've got an optional RESTART actuator which takes you from "ACTIVE" to "STARTING" as well as an optional "SUSPEND" and "RESUME" cycle which takes you via the transitional "SUSPENDING" and "RESUMING" states between "ACTIVE" and "SUSPENDED".

DMTF have another "paused' state but I wonder whether this needs to be a state in its own right or if it's an attribute of "suspended". That's a rhetorical question - we could spend all week discussing nuances but for now I want to make sure we agree on the absolutely minimalist core functionality. Other states can be added via a live registry which we can pre-populate with a view to guiding innovation without stifling it.

This has been uploaded to the wiki: http://forge.ogf.org/sf/wiki/do/viewPage/projects.occi-wg/wiki/StateModel

Sam