Method and system for attribute management in a namespace

1. A method, comprising:

storing, at a computer system, information that implements a namespace having a plurality of objects, wherein the stored information includes data for various ones of the plurality of objects that is indicative of attribute values for one or more of a plurality of object attributes;

receiving, by the computer system, an object associated with a user-defined attribute value;

adding, by the computer system, the object associated with the user-defined attribute value to the namespace;

receiving, by the computer system, first and second queries of the namespace that respectively indicate one or more attribute values and organization of query results, wherein the first query indicates relative levels of object attributes within a first hierarchy of object attributes and wherein the second query indicates relative levels of object attributes within a second hierarchy of object attributes;

generating, by the computer system in response to the first and second queries, respective first and second sets of access data usable to access objects in the namespace that have one or more attribute values that match the one or more attribute values specified by the respective first and second queries; and

transmitting, by the computer system, the first and second sets of access data to one or more second computer systems associated with the first and second queries;

wherein the first and second sets of access data are organized using the respective first and second hierarchies, and wherein the second hierarchy includes a given attribute at a level that is different from a level of the given attribute in the first hierarchy.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the plurality of object attributes includes at least one of: location, media type, style, individual, genre, director, and artist.

3. The method of claim 1 :

wherein the object is associated with a user-defined attribute; the method further comprising:

adding, by the computer system, the attribute to the namespace, wherein the user-defined attribute is not included in the namespace prior to the adding;

wherein the namespace is queryable to return information usable to access the object from the namespace in response to a query that specifies the user-defined attribute value.

4. The method of claim 3 , further comprising synchronizing a second namespace at another computer system to include the user-defined attribute, wherein the second namespace was previously copied from the namespace.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein a display of the respective hierarchies is usable to access content of the plurality of objects.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein the plurality of objects include photo objects.

7. The method of claim 1 , wherein the plurality of objects are media objects and wherein a first one of the one or more attributes indicates an identity of a person associated with the media object.

8. A system, comprising:

a processor; and

a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium having stored thereon instructions that are executable by the processor to cause the system to perform operations comprising:

receiving an object associated with a user-defined attribute value;

adding the object associated with the user-defined attribute value to the namespace;

storing information that implements a namespace having a plurality of objects, wherein the stored information includes data for various ones of the plurality of objects that is indicative of attribute values for one or more of a plurality of object attributes;

receiving first and second queries of the namespace that respectively indicate one or more attribute values and organization of query results, wherein the first query indicates relative levels of object attributes within a first hierarchy of object attributes and wherein the second query indicates relative levels of object attributes within a second hierarchy of object attributes;

generating, in response to the first and second queries, respective first and second sets of access data usable to access objects in the namespace that have one or more attribute values that match the one or more attribute values specified by the respective first and second queries; and

transmitting the first and second sets of access data to one or more second computer systems associated with the first and second queries;

wherein the first and second sets of access data are organized using the respective first and second hierarchies, and wherein the second hierarchy includes a given attribute at a level that is different from a level of the given attribute in the first hierarchy.

9. The system of claim 8 , wherein the plurality of object attributes includes at least one of: location, media type, style, individual, genre, director, and artist.

10. The system of claim 8 , wherein the first and second queries respectively indicate relative levels of object attributes using respective view specifications.

11. The system of claim 8 , wherein the system is configured to store content of the plurality of objects.

12. The system of claim 8 , wherein the operations further comprise synchronizing the namespace with a copy of the namespace maintained at another computer system.

13. The system of claim 12 , wherein synchronizing the namespace includes writing one or more newly created objects from the copy of the namespace maintained at the other computer system into local storage for the namespace at the system.

14. A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium having stored thereon instructions that are executable by a processor of a computer system to cause the computer system to perform operations comprising:

receiving an object associated with a user-defined attribute value;

adding the object associated with the user-defined attribute value to the namespace;

storing information that implements a namespace having a plurality of objects, wherein the stored information includes data for various ones of the plurality of objects that is indicative of attribute values for one or more of a plurality of object attributes;

receiving first and second queries of the namespace that respectively indicate one or more attribute values and organization of query results, wherein the first query indicates relative levels of object attributes within a first hierarchy of object attributes and wherein the second query indicates relative levels of object attributes within a second hierarchy of object attributes;

generating, in response to first and second queries, respective first and second sets of access data usable to access objects in the namespace that have one or more attribute values that match the one or more attribute values specified by the respective first and second queries; and

transmitting the first and second sets of access data to one or more second computer systems associated with the first and second queries;

wherein the first and second sets of access data are organized using the respective hierarchies, and wherein the second hierarchy includes a given attribute at a level that is different from a level of the given attribute in the first hierarchy.

15. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 14 , wherein the first and second queries include respective view specifications that specify the relative levels of object attributes within respective first and second hierarchies.

16. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 14 , wherein at least one of the plurality of object attributes identifies an artist associated with at least one of the plurality of objects.

17. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 14 , wherein at least one of the plurality of object attributes relates to a style of media content.

18. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 14 , wherein a first one of the plurality of object attributes indicates an identity of a person who is represented within the content of at least a first one of the plurality of objects.