Re: "To handle these situations, the management API provides an attribute "restart-required" for operations which can affect the runtime state and will initiate the appropriate restart actions"
To clarify a bit, if an operation is has "all-services" or "jvm" as it's restart-required value, the handler for the operation *should not* trigger a restart. The OperationContext exposes reloadRequired() and restartRequired() methods -- those should be invoked. They mark the server as needing restart. It is up to the user to take action, when they deem appropriate, to effect that restart.
Re: using "resource-services" as the restart-required value and then having the operation handler restart the services: be cautious about doing that. Restarting a service has the effect of restarting any services that depend on that service. That can quickly broaden out to include a restart of a large number of things that the user may not anticipate. Understand that by supporting this you may be giving your users a gun they can shoot themselves with.