Investigations on Soundness Regarding Lazy Activities

Abstract. Current approaches for proving the correctness of business processes focus on either soundness, weak soundness, or relaxed sound-ness. Soundness states that each activity should be on a path from the initial to the final activity, that after the final activity has been reached no other activities should become active, and that there are no unreach-able activities. Relaxed soundness softens soundness by stating that each activity should be able to participate in the business process, whereas weak soundness allows unreachable activities. However, all these kinds of soundness are not satisfactory for processes containing discriminator, n-out-of-m-join or multiple instances without synchronization patterns that can leave running (lazy) activities behind. As these patterns occur in interacting business processes, we propose a solution based on lazy soundness. We utilize the pi-calculus to discuss and implement reasoning on lazy soundness.

BProVe: A formal verification framework for business process models

Business Process Modelling has acquired increasing relevance in software development. Available notations, such as BPMN, permit to describe activities of complex organisations. On the one hand, this shortens the communication gap between domain experts and IT specialists. On the other hand, this permits to clarify the characteristics of software systems introduced to provide automatic support for such activities. Nevertheless, the lack of formal semantics hinders the automatic verification of relevant properties. This paper presents a novel verification framework for BPMN 2.0, called BProVe. It is based on an operational semantics, implemented using MAUDE, devised to make the verification general and effective. A complete tool chain, based on the Eclipse modelling environment, allows for rigorous modelling and analysis of Business Processes. The approach has been validated using more than one thousand models available on a publicly accessible repository. Besides showing the performance of BProVe, this validation demonstrates its practical benefits in identifying correctness issues in real models

An integer programming based approach for diagnosing workflows

Workflow analysis is indispensable to capture modeling errors in workflow designs. While in the past several analysis approaches for workflows have been defined, these approaches do not give precise feedback, making it hard for a designer to pinpoint the exact cause of modeling errors. In this paper we introduce a novel approach for analyzing and diagnosing workflows based on integer programming (IP). Each workflow model is translated into a set of IP constraints. Faulty control flow connectors can be easily detected using the approach by relaxing the corresponding constraints. We show that this approach is correct, and illustrate it with realistic examples where the CPLEX tool is used to solve the IP formulations. Moreover, the approach is flexible and can be extended to handle a variety of new constraints, as well as to support new workflow patterns. Its features complement those of existing approaches

A meaningful workplace : framework, space and context

An attempt was made to describe and to eventually implement work space that can be defined as psychologically meaningful and which has increased during the past 5−10 years. Indications are that various researchers on different continents have embarked on a journey to describe the meaningful workplace. Such a workplace is more than a geographical location, it is psychological space; space where the individual employee performs tasks that construe his or her work role, in collaboration with other individuals, within a framework of predetermined time frames, according to certain procedures, based on identified needs and within a formal workflow structure that is normally referred to as the organisation. Within this framework employees become alienated as a result of which the organisation as well as the individual suffer. The organisation experiences a loss of productivity, quality, innovation, et cetera, and the employee a loss of meaning in life and work. Yet, the workplace remains the space where meaning can be gained. It is both the framework and context for meaningfulness at work. Within this framework certain factors and constitutive elements play a facilitating role in experiencing meaningfulness. Various factors including values, and imbedded therein, the Protestant Ethic (PE), (and various other factors, such as for instance spirituality, culture, leadership and management style, etc.), play an important role as facilitating factors towards the experience of meaningfulness at work. Developing a framework and context, on a conceptual level for the positioning of these factors as contributories towards the meaningful workplace, is a first priority. This is what this article is about: to conceptualise the workplace as psychological space, framework and context for understanding the contributory role of PE (and other factors) towards the experience of meaningfulness at work. The positioning of values and the PE as Max Weber understood the concept will be presented in a follow-on article.http://www.hts.org.zaam2013ff201