jac

Just to flesh out the proposal, here’s what I’d suggest.
Edit the menu generation function in /wp-admin/menu.php to pull user levels from a new table.
Replace all hard-coded user levels in the various files with calls to the table.
Add an admin function to manage these levels, and turn on / off various functions (users can / can’t post without logging in, moderate individual users, etc.).
One possible default user schema is:
User Level 0 – Unregistered, or registered but unapproved/unpromoted.
User Level 1 – Approved but moderated. Able to post comments into approval queue.
User Level 2 – Able to post comments, edit own comments. Ditto links.
User Level 3 – Able to post categories, add images to comments, post to blog.
User Level 4 – Functionally, a moderator.
Can manage users, edit posts and comments of others.
Can promote users from level 0 up to level 3.
Can demote users from level 3.
Can NOT change the user status of other moderators.
User Level 5 – Can edit timestamps of posts and comments.
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User Level 10 – Site Goddess. Can cause rain to fall, crops to fail, rivers to fill with blood.
This is purely arbitrary, somewhat based on the existing hard-coded values.
One possible table structure:
CREATE TABLE $wpdb->user_level_config (
admin_set_userlevels int(2) NOT NULL default 10,
admin_upgrade_version int(2) NOT NULL default 10,
admin_manage_plugins int(2) NOT NULL default 10,
admin_edit_blog_options int(2) NOT NULL default 10,
admin_edit_templates int(2) NOT NULL default 10,
admin_upload int(2) NOT NULL default 10,
mod_comments int(2) NOT NULL default 4,
mod_posts int(2) NOT NULL default 4,
mod_links int(2) NOT NULL default 4,
mod_categories int(2) NOT NULL default 4,
mod_users int(2) NOT NULL default 4,
post_write int(2) NOT NULL default 3,
post_edit int(2) NOT NULL default 3,
post_edit_timestamp int(2) NOT NULL default 5,
post_del int(2) NOT NULL default 3,
comment_add int(2) NOT NULL default 0,
comment_edit int(2) NOT NULL default 2,
comment_edit_timestamp int(2) NOT NULL default 5,
comment_del int(2) NOT NULL default 2,
link_add int(2) NOT NULL default 2,
link_edit int(2) NOT NULL default 3,
link_del int(2) NOT NULL default 3,
categories_add int(2) NOT NULL default 3,
categories_edit int(2) NOT NULL default 3,
categories_del int(2) NOT NULL default 3,
user_add int(2) NOT NULL default 4,
user_edit int(2) NOT NULL default 2,
user_del int(2) NOT NULL default 2,
user_moderated int(2) NOT NULL default 1
)
If a current WordPress user likes the way things run today, he need only adjust the user levels so that anonymous posts and registrations work the way they do today.