Invalidation Of Metadata Buffers

A quick buffer validity check can optionally be performed when a potential invalidity of the content of a buffer is identified. The identifying of the potential invalidity condition can include determining that a most recent lifecycle management event timestamp is more recent than a most recent buffer validity check timestamp for the buffer. To determine whether the buffer contents need to be refreshed, a list of the last changed timestamps for the constituent elements of the buffer can be compared to a new list. If the new list and the old list are not identical, the buffer can be rebuilt.