Tackling Dierent Business Process Perspectives

Business Process Management (BPM) has emerged as a discipline to design, control, analyze, and optimize business operations. Conceptual models lie at the core of BPM. In particular, business process models have been taken up by organizations as a means to describe the main activities that are performed to achieve a specific business goal. Process models generally cover different perspectives that underlie separate yet interrelated representations for analyzing and presenting process information. Being primarily driven by process improvement objectives, traditional business process modeling languages focus on capturing the control flow perspective of business processes, that is, the temporal and logical coordination of activities. Such approaches are usually characterized as \u201cactivity-centric\u201d. Nowadays, activity-centric process modeling languages, such as the Business Process Model and Notation (BPMN) standard, are still the most used in practice and benefit from industrial tool support. Nevertheless, evidence shows that such process modeling languages still lack of support for modeling non-control-flow perspectives, such as the temporal, informational, and decision perspectives, among others. This thesis centres on the BPMN standard and addresses the modeling the temporal, informational, and decision perspectives of process models, with particular attention to processes enacted in healthcare domains. Despite being partially interrelated, the main contributions of this thesis may be partitioned according to the modeling perspective they concern. The temporal perspective deals with the specification, management, and formal verification of temporal constraints. In this thesis, we address the specification and run-time management of temporal constraints in BPMN, by taking advantage of process modularity and of event handling mechanisms included in the standard. Then, we propose three different mappings from BPMN to formal models, to validate the behavior of the proposed process models and to check whether they are dynamically controllable. The informational perspective represents the information entities consumed, produced or manipulated by a process. This thesis focuses on the conceptual connection between processes and data, borrowing concepts from the database domain to enable the representation of which part of a database schema is accessed by a certain process activity. This novel conceptual view is then employed to detect potential data inconsistencies arising when the same data are accessed erroneously by different process activities. The decision perspective encompasses the modeling of the decision-making related to a process, considering where decisions are made in the process and how decision outcomes affect process execution. In this thesis, we investigate the use of the Decision Model and Notation (DMN) standard in conjunction with BPMN starting from a pattern-based approach to ease the derivation of DMN decision models from the data represented in BPMN processes. Besides, we propose a methodology that focuses on the integrated use of BPMN and DMN for modeling decision-intensive care pathways in a real-world application domain

Simulation Modelling Practice and Theory

The influx of data in the world today needs analysis that no one method can handle. Some reports estimated the influx of data would reach 163 zitabytes by 2025, hence the need for simulation and modeling theory and practice. Simulation and modeling tools and techniques are most important in this day and age. While simulation carries the needed work, tools for visualizing the results help in the decision-making process. Simulation ranges from a simple queue to molecular dynamics, including seismic reliability analysis, structural integrity assessment, games, reliability engineering, and system safety. This book will introduce practitioners, researchers, and novice users to simulation and modeling, and to the world of imagination

GIS in Healthcare

The landscape of healthcare is dynamic, gradually becoming more complicated with factors beyond simple supply and demand. Similar to the diversity of social, political and economic contexts, the practical utilization of healthcare resources also varies around the world. However, the spatial components of these contexts, along with aspects of supply and demand, can reveal a common theme among these factors. This book presents advancements in GIS applications that reveal the complexity of and solutions for a dynamic healthcare landscape

Design and Management of Manufacturing Systems

Although the design and management of manufacturing systems have been explored in the literature for many years now, they still remain topical problems in the current scientific research. The changing market trends, globalization, the constant pressure to reduce production costs, and technical and technological progress make it necessary to search for new manufacturing methods and ways of organizing them, and to modify manufacturing system design paradigms. This book presents current research in different areas connected with the design and management of manufacturing systems and covers such subject areas as: methods supporting the design of manufacturing systems, methods of improving maintenance processes in companies, the design and improvement of manufacturing processes, the control of production processes in modern manufacturing systems production methods and techniques used in modern manufacturing systems and environmental aspects of production and their impact on the design and management of manufacturing systems. The wide range of research findings reported in this book confirms that the design of manufacturing systems is a complex problem and that the achievement of goals set for modern manufacturing systems requires interdisciplinary knowledge and the simultaneous design of the product, process and system, as well as the knowledge of modern manufacturing and organizational methods and techniques

Safety and Reliability - Safe Societies in a Changing World

The contributions cover a wide range of methodologies and application areas for safety and reliability that contribute to safe societies in a changing world. These methodologies and applications include: - foundations of risk and reliability assessment and management - mathematical methods in reliability and safety - risk assessment - risk management - system reliability - uncertainty analysis - digitalization and big data - prognostics and system health management - occupational safety - accident and incident modeling - maintenance modeling and applications - simulation for safety and reliability analysis - dynamic risk and barrier management - organizational factors and safety culture - human factors and human reliability - resilience engineering - structural reliability - natural hazards - security - economic analysis in risk managemen

Engenharia de sistemas baseada em modelos: um sistema para o tráfego & ambiente

Doutoramento em Gestão IndustrialThe contemporary world is crowded of large, interdisciplinary, complex systems made of other systems, personnel, hardware, software, information, processes, and facilities. The Systems Engineering (SE) field proposes an integrated holistic approach to tackle these socio-technical systems that is crucial to take proper account of their multifaceted nature and numerous interrelationships, providing the means to enable their successful realization. Model-Based Systems Engineering (MBSE) is an emerging paradigm in the SE field and can be described as the formalized application of modelling principles, methods, languages, and tools to the entire lifecycle of those systems, enhancing communications and knowledge capture, shared understanding, improved design precision and integrity, better development traceability, and reduced development risks. This thesis is devoted to the application of the novel MBSE paradigm to the Urban Traffic & Environment domain. The proposed system, the GUILTE (Guiding Urban Intelligent Traffic & Environment), deals with a present-day real challenging problem “at the agenda” of world leaders, national governors, local authorities, research agencies, academia, and general public. The main purposes of the system are to provide an integrated development framework for the municipalities, and to support the (short-time and real-time) operations of the urban traffic through Intelligent Transportation Systems, highlighting two fundamental aspects: the evaluation of the related environmental impacts (in particular, the air pollution and the noise), and the dissemination of information to the citizens, endorsing their involvement and participation. These objectives are related with the high-level complex challenge of developing sustainable urban transportation networks. The development process of the GUILTE system is supported by a new methodology, the LITHE (Agile Systems Modelling Engineering), which aims to lightening the complexity and burdensome of the existing methodologies by emphasizing agile principles such as continuous communication, feedback, stakeholders involvement, short iterations and rapid response. These principles are accomplished through a universal and intuitive SE process, the SIMILAR process model (which was redefined at the light of the modern international standards), a lean MBSE method, and a coherent System Model developed through the benchmark graphical modeling languages SysML and OPDs/OPL. The main contributions of the work are, in their essence, models and can be settled as: a revised process model for the SE field, an agile methodology for MBSE development environments, a graphical tool to support the proposed methodology, and a System Model for the GUILTE system. The comprehensive literature reviews provided for the main scientific field of this research (SE/MBSE) and for the application domain (Traffic & Environment) can also be seen as a relevant contribution.O mundo contemporâneo é caracterizado por sistemas de grande dimensão e de natureza marcadamente complexa, sócio-técnica e interdisciplinar. A Engenharia de Sistemas (ES) propõe uma abordagem holística e integrada para desenvolver tais sistemas, tendo em consideração a sua natureza multifacetada e as numerosas inter-relações que advêm de uma quantidade significativa de diferentes pontos de vista, competências, responsabilidades e interesses. A Engenharia de Sistemas Baseada em Modelos (ESBM) é um paradigma emergente na área da ES e pode ser descrito como a aplicação formal de princípios, métodos, linguagens e ferramentas de modelação ao ciclo de vida dos sistemas descritos. Espera-se que, na próxima década, a ESBM desempenhe um papel fundamental na prática da moderna Engenharia de Sistemas. Esta tese é dedicada à aplicação da ESBM a um desafio real que constitui uma preocupação do mundo actual, estando “na agenda” dos líderes mundiais, governantes nacionais, autoridades locais, agências de investigação, universidades e público em geral. O domínio de aplicação, o Tráfego & Ambiente, caracteriza-se por uma considerável complexidade e interdisciplinaridade, sendo representativo das áreas de interesse para a ES. Propõe-se um sistema (GUILTE) que visa dotar os municípios de um quadro de desenvolvimento integrado para adopção de Sistemas de Transporte Inteligentes e apoiar as suas operações de tráfego urbano, destacando dois aspectos fundamentais: a avaliação dos impactos ambientais associados (em especial, a poluição atmosférica e o ruído) e a divulgação de informação aos cidadãos, motivando o seu envolvimento e participação. Estes objectivos relacionam-se com o desafio mais abrangente de desenvolver redes de transporte urbano sustentáveis. O processo de desenvolvimento do sistema apoia-se numa nova metodologia (LITHE), mais ágil, que enfatiza os princípios de comunicação contínua, feedback, participação e envolvimento dos stakeholders, iterações curtas e resposta rápida. Estes princípios são concretizados através de um processo de ES universal e intuitivo (redefinido à luz dos padrões internacionais), de um método simples e de linguagens gráficas de modelação de referência (SysML e OPDs/OPL). As principais contribuições deste trabalho são, na sua essência, modelos: um modelo revisto para o processo da ES, uma metodologia ágil para ambientes de desenvolvimento baseados em modelos, uma ferramenta gráfica para suportar a metodologia proposta e o modelo de um sistema para as operações de tráfego & ambiente num contexto urbano. Contribui-se ainda com uma cuidada revisão bibliográfica para a principal área de investigação (ES/ESBM) e para o domínio de aplicação (Tráfego & Ambiente)

”Et nää on näitä meiän kyberhyökkäyksiä nämä” – The government of one and all in everyday digital security in Finnish Lapland

The government of one and all in everyday digital security in Finnish Lapland This study contextualises the gradual institutionalising of conventional concepts of cybersecurity by providing a more human-centric perspective. While discussion of cybersecurity can be encountered in daily news and in the workplace ever more frequently, its content and practical implications often remain abstract to everyday life. When cybersecurity is understandably addressed in highly technical and/or strategic terms, involving specific threat imageries and vocabularies, the mundane effects of the (un)successful securitisation of cyberspace can receive less attention. However, it is precisely these everyday effects that justify and undermine everyday cyber/digital security, and influence the respective security roles assigned to all citizens in emerging cyber-physical societies. Drawing out commonalities and differences between human security and governmentality studies, this thesis critically examines the entanglement of digitalisation and cyber/digital security in Finnish Lapland: opportunities it provides and concerns it awakes in sparsely populated areas characterised by harsh climate, cultural diversity, long distances, and infrastructural issues, all of which relate to imagery of the Arctic as a developing region. It investigates the power relations and positions thus created, mainly through securitisation, development, and resilience. However, it also incorporates the related techniques of responsibilisation, human rights, commercialisation, surveillance and transparency, and, finally, techniques of the self, which aim at the assimilation of modern governmentality but also provide the means for its resistance. While digitalisation in Lapland is carried out with the stated aim of continuing service provision or improving it, it is efficiency and cost calculations that drive it. Digitalisation and cyber/digital security are not generally examined together but as two separate trajectories. This thesis brings them together hence addressing both positive (freedom to) and negative (freedom from) security. It also provides localised research on the effects of digitalisation in the northernmost areas of Finland, Sweden and Norway, partially addressing a gap in the current knowledgebase. The research was carried out by problematising the mainstream framings of cyber/digital security from a number of individual security perspectives: applying human security to digitalisation and cybersecurity in the European High North, examining the interconnection of digitalisation and regional re-organisation of health and social services, studying the responsibilisation of the users of digital sharing economy platforms in contract law, and through a case study on the use of ICT and views on the requisite security roles amongst people living in Lapland. The synthesis re-problematises a human security approach to digitalisation through governmentality studies. This move visualises power relations embedded in human security that regardless of its emancipatory aim turn the approach to support modern governmentality through responsibilisation of individuals and communities for their own security and wellbeing. The theories and approaches covered in this thesis show that a multitude of human behaviours in digitality ought to be acknowledged and security practices able to accommodate it developed. In the prevailing framings of cybersecurity, ICT corporations and states and/or societies are constituted as the main objects and subjects of security, whereas individuals are expected to behave in a digisavvy and safe manner and thus contribute to the overall effort of securing cyberspace. The main forms of public support in meeting the requirements of this kind of subjectivity are information provision, guidance and training, as well as societal accessibility policies. The aims of and values embedded in digitalisation remain unquestioned and increased connectivity is automatically expected to improve everyone’s quality of life. However, digitalisation also leads to novel inequalities, power imbalances and dependencies – or aggravates the existing ones – and to a loss of self-sufficiency. Digitalisation will not be turned around. However, as the power relations and positions it creates have not yet been firmly institutionalised, there is possibility to impact them, to turn them into networked relations that take people’s needs, wants and wishes into account – instead of advancing digitalisation merely in the terms of technology and/or administration. Instead of approaching people as a vulnerability and hence in need of education and support, they ought to be viewed as subjects who can decide for themselves. At the heart of this struggle is the question of what kind of world we wish to live in.Yksilön ja yhteisön hallinta arkipäivän digitaalisen turvallisuuden kautta Lapissa Tutkin tässä väitöskirjassa kyberturvallisuuden tavanomaisia, vähitellen institutionalisoituvia käsitteellistyksiä ihmiskeskeisestä näkökulmasta. Samalla kun kyberturvallisuudesta on tulossa uutisten ja työpaikkakeskusteluiden vakioaihe, sen sisältö ja käytännön vaikutukset jäävät usein abstrakteiksi ja kaukaisiksi ihmisten arkipäivän kokemuksesta. Tekninen ja/tai strateginen lähestymistapa kyberturvallisuuteen jättää kyberavaruuden (epä)onnistuneen turvallistamisen arkipäivän vaikutukset suhteellisen vähälle huomiolle, mikä on aiheen teknisyyden ja turvallisuuspoliittisen merkityksen vuoksi ymmärrettävää. Samalla se kuitenkin tuo mukanaan tietyt uhkakuvastot ja sanastot aiheen käsittelyyn, mikä rajoittaa sitä, millaisia sisältöjä kyberturvallisuus voi saada ja millaisia politiikkatoimia siihen voi kohdistua. Siitäkin huolimatta, että juuri ihmisten arkipäivän kokemukset joko oikeuttavat tai kyseenalaistavat kyber-/digiturvallisuuden politiikkana ja ne turvallisuusroolit, joita kansalaisille kehittymässä olevissa kyber-fyysisissä yhteiskunnissa asetellaan. Tarkastelen tutkimuksessa digitalisaation ja kyber-/digiturvallisuuden kietoutumista yhteen inhimillisen turvallisuuden ja hallinnan analytiikan teorioiden avulla. Keskityn digitalisaation avaamiin mahdollisuuksiin ja sen herättämiin turvallisuushuoliin Suomen Lapissa, jota luonnehtivat vähäväkisyys, kulttuurinen monimuotoisuus, haasteellinen ilmasto, pitkät etäisyydet ja infrastruktuurihaasteet. Edellä mainitut piirteet vaikuttavat siihen, että arktiset alueet mielletään usein kehittyviksi alueiksi ja niihin kohdistetaan tämän mukaisia politiikkatoimia. Mielikuvan mukaiset puhetavat ja käytännön toimet luovat valtasuhteiden ja valta-asemien verkoston, mitä havainnollistan pääosin turvallistamisen, kehityksen ja resilienssin tekniikoiden kuvauksen kautta. Kuvaukseen sisältyvät myös edellisiin liittyvät vastuuttamisen, ihmisoikeuksien, kaupallistamisen, valvonnan ja läpinäkyvyyden tekniikat, samoin kuin itsetekniikat, joilla pyritään modernin hallinnallisuuden sisäistämiseen, mutta jotka samalla mahdollistavat sen vastustamisen. Vaikka Lapin digitalisoitumisen julkilausuttu tavoite on ylläpitää tai parantaa palveluiden tarjontaa, sitä edistävät ensisijaisesti tehokkuus- ja kustannuslaskelmat. Digitalisaatiota ja kyber-/digiturvallisuutta tutkitaan yleensä kahtena erillisenä kehityskulkuna. Väitöskirjassa tuon nämä kehityskulut yhteen ja tarkastelen niin positiivista (vapaus johonkin) kuin negatiivista (vapaus jostakin) turvallisuutta. Lisäksi kontekstualisoin tutkimuksen Suomen, Ruotsin ja Norjan pohjoisimmille alueille, joilta vastaavanlaista tutkimusta on suhteellisen vähän. Tutkimuksessa problematisoin kyber-/digiturvallisuuden valtavirran käsitteellistykset yksilöturvallisuuden eri näkökulmista: soveltamalla inhimillisen turvallisuuden lähestymistapaa digitalisaatioon ja kyberturvallisuuteen Euroopan pohjoisimmilla alueilla, tarkastelemalla digitalisaation ja alueellisen terveys- ja sosiaalipalveluiden uudistuksen välisiä kytköksiä, tutkimalla jakamistalouden digitaalisten alustojen käyttäjien vastuuttamista sopimusoikeudessa sekä tapaustutkimuksella Lapin asukkaiden tietotekniikan käytöstä ja näkemyksistä kyber-/digiturvallisuuden roolituksista. Väitöskirjan synteesi problematisoi inhimillisen turvallisuuden lähestymistavan uudelleen hallinnan analytiikan avulla. Tämä teko visualisoi inhimillisen turvallisuuden sisältämät valtasuhteet, jotka voimaannuttamispyrkimyksistään huolimatta ajautuvat tukemaan modernia hallinnallisuutta vastuuttamalla yksilöt ja yhteisöt heidän omasta turvallisuudestaan ja hyvinvoinnistaan. Väitöskirjan sisältämät teoriat ja lähestymistavat painottavat inhimillisen käytöksen moninaisuutta digitaalisuudessa, mikä pitäisi tunnistaa ja kyetä huomioimaan turvallisuuden käytännöissä. Kyberturvallisuuden valtavirran käsitteellistyksissä tieto- ja viestintäteknologiayritykset sekä valtio ja/tai yhteiskunta ovat turvallisuuden pääasialliset viittauskohteet ja toimijat. Yksilöiden oletetaan toimivan taitavasti ja turvallisesti siten tehden oman osansa kyberavaruuden turvallistamisessa. Pääasialliset julkisen tuen muodot tämänkaltaisen toimijuuden saavuttamiseksi ovat tiedon tuottaminen, ohjaaminen ja harjoitukset, sekä erilaiset saavutettavuuspolitiikat ja -ohjelmat. Digitalisaation tavoitteita tai sen edistämiä arvoja ei kyseenalaisteta. Sen sijaan parempien viestintäyhteyksien oletetaan automaattisesti parantavan jokaisen elämänlaatua. Digitalisaatio kuitenkin tuottaa myös uudenlaista epätasa-arvoisuutta, vallan epätasapainoa ja riippuvuutta samalla kun se vahvistaa aiempia epätasa-arvoisuuksia ja riippuvuuksia sekä heikentää itseriittoisuutta ja omaehtoisuutta. Digitalisaatio ei ole kehityskulku, joka on käännettävissä ympäri. Niin kauan kuin sen luomat valtasuhteet ja -asemat eivät ole vahvasti institutionalisoituneet, niihin voidaan vaikuttaa. Tavoitteena tulisi olla valtasuhteiden verkosto, joka huomioi ihmisten tarpeet, tavoitteet ja toiveet sen sijaan, että digitalisaatiota edistetään ainoastaan teknologian ja/tai hallinnon ehdoilla. Sen sijaan, että ihmiset hahmotetaan haavoittuvuutena ja siksi koulutuksen sekä tuen kohteena, heidät pitäisi nähdä toimijoina, jotka päättävät omasta puolestaan. Tämän valtataistelun keskiössä on kysymys siitä, millaisessa maailmassa haluamme elää