NeXgeN Permissions & Roles:

Roles and Permissions for Elgg should not be so hardd;
and should not require a rocket science degree in coding PHP structures ;-)
In order to have truly granular control of accesses -
a R&P methodology designed around PHP data structues -

Therefore one needs coding to control approx 1000 resources (assets)
in the basic Elgg install with the bare-bones 'core' plugins !
And if you're a simple user, not a 'coder' -
you gonna have diddley's chance of
making such a system work for you ;-)

A careful study of the inherent structures that comprise Elgg's entities
and objects,owners, collections.. will be needed to design (and implement)
a workable R&P system for Elgg -
one that works for everyone -- without the need to code.

[ Yep..! if you've caught the drift via my 'neXgeN' posts..
  I am working on a R&P system for Elgg that will truly blow
  your minds away - by it's sheer simplicity & ease of use..
  a direction that seems to been already catered for
  by Elgg's original Design ]