Nimbostratus1. Am I correct that the editor needs to connect to a BigIP to function?
You are correct. The iRule editor was built as a live extension to the BIG-IP configuration. It needs a connection to a BIG-IP to validate the format.
2. Does the editor use iControl to communicate with BigIP?
Absolutely.
3. Is there a basic permission type that one would setup to allow users to use the editor? I read about the roles in the SDK and I could see a case that a non-admin user is an editor of a partition that allows them to edit rules but it wasn't clear.
An Administrator level account is required to make use of all of the editor features. Also, currently the Editor does not support partitions aside from the default partition.
4. If this was actually in the docs, let me know where. I was looking for a basic text that said something like "To use the iRules editor, you must have _____access to a BigIP and a user account with the _______privilege. I might have missed it.
It's not in the Editor docs, I'll have to look into building a better FAQ for iControl in general. To use the iControl methods, the user must have Operator access to read and partial write (enable/disable operations). The account must be an Admin or Application Security Policy Editor to modify to create/remove objects.
-Joe
