AMFIBIA: A Meta-Model for the Integration of Business Process Modelling Aspects

Today, there are many different formalisms and notations for modelling business processes. Though most of the formalisms have their justification, the plethora of notations makes it hard to compare and to exchange business process models among different tools. AMFIBIA (A Meta-model For the Integration of BusIness process modelling Aspects) sets out to capture the basic aspects of business process models and to define their concepts independently from a particular formalism and notation, and then map different formalisms to these basic concepts. This way, business process models can be compared with each other, and it will be even possible, to integrate and combine different formalisms in a single workflow engine. Currently, we implement a prototype of a workflow engine, which supports the concepts of AMFIBIA. Since the development of AMFIBIA started quite late in the history of workflow management, it might not have strong impact on existing workflow management systems. The concepts of AMFIBIA, however, should be applicable to SOA, were formalism independence is even more important. The talk presents the ideas and concepts of AMFIBIA and intends to trigger a discussion on the aspects of SOA and the aspects and concepts that need to me captured in SOA

Operations and Tool Support for Public View Transformations of Business Processes

This paper shows operations on models to derive Collaborative Business Processes models on a conceptual level that satisfy the requirements of information hiding and furthermore to use these reduced models for a configuration of executing information systems

Yet Another Event-driven Process Chain - Modelling Workflow Patterns with yEPCs

The 20 workflow patterns proposed by van der Aalst et al. provide a comprehensive benchmark for comparing process modelling languages. In this article, we discuss workflow pattern support of Event-Driven Process Chains (EPCs). Building on this analysis, we propose three extensions to EPCs in order to provide for workflow pattern support. These are the introduction of the so-called empty connector; inclusion of multiple instantiation concepts; and a cancellation construct. As both the latter are inspired by YAWL, we refer to this new class of EPCs as Yet Another Event-driven Process Chain (yEPC). Furthermore, we sketch how a transformation to YAWL can be used to specify the semantics of yEPCs

Mapping business processes models from Petri nets into event-driven process chains

Business Process Reuse is an important phase in the Business Process life-cycle that for some reason has not attracted enough attention. To support the reuse phase we are building a software infrastructure called the Process Assembler. Process reuse involves many steps. In the paper we briefly discuss all of them, but then focus only on the mapping from one process definition language (which is Petri Nets) into another (Event-driven Process Chains). We build the mapping algorithm and support it by software, which is the core of the Mapper component of a system that is currently under construction. An example demonstrating the work of the algorithm is also provided

Aide à la conception de Système d'Information Collaboratif , support de l'interopérabilité des entreprises

Dans un contexte de collaboration industrielle ou inter-organisationnelle, la qualité de l'intégration des différents partenaires dépend grandement de la capacité de leurs systèmes d'information (SI) à interagir efficacement. C'est pourquoi nous proposons dans ce manuscrit d'aborder cette problématique selon l'angle de l'interopérabilité des systèmes d'information. Dans notre approche, l'interopérabilité des SI des partenaires s'appuie conceptuellement sur deux caractéristiques : (i) la faculté de ces SI à se conformer à une orientation services (SOA pour Service-Oriented Architecture) et (ii) le positionnement au sein du réseau de partenaires d'un système d'information médiateur destiné à assurer l'intégration du "système de systèmes" ainsi créé. Ces travaux de thèse traitent précisément de la conception de ce médiateur selon une démarche MDA (Model Driven Architecture). Notre approche consiste à étudier la traduction d'un modèle des besoins situé au niveau "métier" en un modèle d'architecture spécifique situé au niveau "logique". Pour cela, nous allons considérer que la connaissance contenue dans un modèle de processus collaboratif (formalisé en BPMN, au niveau CIM de l'approche MDA) pourrait permettre d'alimenter une démarche de modélisation de ce SI médiateur (formalisé en UML, au niveau PIM de l'approche MDA). Ce travail comporte et après avoir exposé les fondements théoriques de ces propositions, une présentation des principes de traduction de ces modèles, ainsi que les règles de transformation qui les concrétisent. Enfin, la maquette outil logiciel supportant cette démarche et permettant d'assurer cette modélisation du médiateur a été réalisée. ABSTRACT : In a collaborative context, the integration of industrial partners deeply depends of the ability of their Information Systems (IS) to interact efficiently. In this document we propose to tackle this point according to the point of view of IS interoperability. Interoperability of partners' IS is based on two main aspects: (i) the fact that partners' IS respect SOA (Service-Oriented Approach) concepts and (ii) the support of a Mediation Information System (MIS) able to put IS together in one single merging System of Systems (SoS). We propose to design such a MIS according to MDA (model-Driven Approach) principles. We aim at using business model (the needs) to design a logical model of a solution (logical architecture). The business model is a collaborative business model (in BPMN, at the CIM level), while the logical model is a MIS model (using UML, at the PIM level). This document presents the theoretical aspects of this subject, the mechanisms of transformation and the dedicated translation rules. Finally, we show the prototype of a demonstration tool embedding the transformation rules and running those principle

Konfigurierbare Visualisierung komplexer Prozessmodelle

Die in heutigen Unternehmen durch Informationssysteme unterstützten Geschäftsprozesse werden zunehmend komplexer. Häufig existieren keine zentralen Steuereinheiten, sondern die Ausführung eines Prozesses ist auf viele heterogene Systeme verteilt. Ohne entsprechende Werkzeugunterstützung ist es daher schwer, einen Überblick über den aktuellen Ausführungsstatus solcher fragmentierter Prozesse zu bewahren. Eine Visualisierungskomponente, welche die Prozesse (inkl. relevanter Applikationsdaten) durchgängig darstellt, ist hier essenziell. Allerdings muss eine solche Komponente in der Lage sein, die Informationsbedürfnisse der verschiedenen Benutzergruppen adäquat zu befriedigen. Typischerweise gibt es hier unterschiedliche Anforderungen an eine Prozessvisualisierung im Hinblick auf Detaillierungsgrad, angezeigte Daten und graphische Informationsaufbereitung. Heutige Werkzeuge stellen Prozesse meist in exakt derselben Form dar, wie sie vom Prozessmodellierer ursprünglich gezeichnet worden sind. Eine flexible Anpassung der Darstellung an die Bedürfnisse des Betrachters ist nicht oder nur in sehr engen Grenzen möglich. Diese Arbeit stellt mit Proviado ein Rahmenwerk für die konfigurierbare Visualisierung komplexer Prozesse vor. Proviado ermöglicht sowohl eine strukturelle als auch eine graphische Anpassung der Prozessvisualisierung. Mit Hilfe eines mächtigen View-Mechanismus können Prozessmodelle strukturell an die Bedürfnisse ihrer Betrachter angepasst werden, indem Prozesselemente reduziert oder zu abstrakten Elementen aggregiert werden. Es werden View-Bildungsoperationen bereitgestellt, die in mehreren Schichten organisiert sind. Mittels Konfigurationsparametern, die die Eigenschaften der resultierenden Prozessmodelle beeinflussen, kann die View-Bildung flexibel konfiguriert und an die Bedürfnisse des jeweiligen Anwendungsfalls angepasst werden. Weitere Möglichkeiten zur graphischen Konfiguration einer Prozessvisualisierung bietet ein fortschrittlicher Template-Mechanismus. Zum einen können die für die Visualisierung zu verwendenden Symbole einfach definiert werden. Zum anderen erlaubt dieser Mechanismus eine flexible Zuordnung der Symbole einer Prozessnotation zu Prozesselementen. Diese Zuordnung kann entweder statisch (z.B. abhängig vom Prozesselementtyp) oder dynamisch, d.h. abhängig von Laufzeitdaten (z.B. Ausführungszustand), erfolgen. Diese beiden Basismechanismen werden ergänzt um Konzepte, die für die Realisierung einer umfassenden Visualisierungskomponente unverzichtbar sind. Dazu zählen unter anderem die Anbindung prozessunterstützender Systeme (d.h. die Integration von Modell- und Laufzeitdaten) sowie Konzepte für das automatische Layout dynamisch berechneter Prozessgraphen. Insgesamt können mit Proviado Prozessvisualisierungen strukturell und graphisch an die Bedürfnisse des jeweiligen Betrachters angepasst werden. Die entsprechenden Darstellungen bieten allen in die Prozesse involvierten Personen eine wesentlich bessere Unterstützung bei der täglichen Arbeit als derzeit verfügbare Systeme

SECURITY POLICY ENFORCEMENT IN APPLICATION ENVIRONMENTS USING DISTRIBUTED SCRIPT-BASED CONTROL STRUCTURES

Business processes involving several partners in different organisations impose demanding requirements on procedures for specification, execution and maintenance. A framework referred to as business process management (BPM) has evolved for this purpose over the last ten years. Other approaches, such as service-oriented architecture (SOA) or the concept of virtual organisations (VOs), assist in the definition of architectures and procedures for modelling and execution of so-called collaborative business processes (CBPs). Methods for the specification of business processes play a central role in this context, and, several standards have emerged for this purpose. Among these, Web Services Business Process Execution Language (WS-BPEL, usually abbreviated BPEL) has evolved to become the de facto standard for business process definition. As such, this language has been selected as the foundation for the research in this thesis. Having a broadly accepted standard would principally allow the specification of business processes in a platform-independent manner, including the capability to specify them at one location and have them executed at others (possibly spread across different organisations). Though technically feasible, this approach has significant security implications, particularly on the side that is to execute a process. The research project focused upon these security issues arising when business processes are specified and executed in a distributed manner. The central goal has been the development of methods to cope with the security issues arising when BPEL as a standard is deployed in such a way exploiting the significant aspect of a standard to be platform-independent The research devised novel methods for specifying security policies in such a manner that the assessment of compliance with these policies is greatly facilitated such that the assessment becomes suited to be performed automatically. An analysis of the securityrelevant semantics of BPEL as a specification language was conducted that resulted in the identification of so-called security-relevant semantic patterns. Based on these results, methods to specify security policy-implied restrictions in terms of such semantic patterns and to assess the compliance of BPEL scripts with these policies have been developed. These methods are particularly suited for assessment of remotely defined BPEL scripts since they allow for pre-execution enforcement of local security policies thereby mitigating or even removing the security implications involved in distributed definition and execution of business processes. As initially envisaged, these methods are comparatively easy to apply, as they are based on technologies customary for practitioners in this field. The viability of the methods proposed for automatic compliance assessment has been proven via a prototypic implementation of the essential functionality required for proof-of-concept.Darmstadt Node of the NRG Network at University of Applied Sciences Darmstad

Overcoming Semantical Heterogeneity in Multiple Data Warehouse Systems

Der bedarfsorientierte Zugriff auf ein konsolidiertes Berichtswesen stellt für betriebliche Organisationen einen entscheidenden Erfolgsfaktor dar, um einen Informationsvorsprung gegenüber ihren Wettbewerbern erzielen zu können. Data-Warehouse-Systeme (DWH-Systeme) dienen dazu, Entscheidungsträgern die für ihre aktuelle Aufgabe relevanten Informationen rechtzeitig und in geeigneter Form zur Verfügung zu stellen. In der Praxis existieren jedoch multiple DWH-Systeme, die vor allem auf Ebene der Datenschemata sowie der zugrunde liegenden Terminologien eine starke Heterogenität aufweisen. Inkonsistenzen zwischen den generierten Berichten sowie eine divergente Interpretation der Berichtsergebnisse sind die Folge. Der Aufbau eines konsolidierten Berichtswesens ist daher nur mit nachträglichem, manuellem Abstimmungsaufwand möglich. Die vorliegende Arbeit widmet sich insbesondere dem durch multiple DWH-Systeme offerierten Informationsangebot. Mithilfe der im Semantic Web etablierten Technologie Resource Description Framework (RDF) und der Web Ontology Language (OWL) wird ein Rahmen zur semantisch reichhaltigen Beschreibung von DWH-Metadaten geschaffen. Derartig ausgezeichnete Metadaten unterschiedlicher DWH-Systeme werden anschließend in einer semantischen Homogenisierungsschicht (sHGS) zusammengeführt. Mit diesem Hilfsmittel können Beziehungen zwischen multiplen DWH-Systemen identifiziert und deren semantische Heterogenität überwunden werden.The demand-oriented access to consolidated reporting systems represents a critical success factor for operating organisations in order to achieve an informational advantage over their competitors. Data warehouse systems (DWH systems) provide decision-makers with information relevant to their current task in due time and form. In practice, however, a multitude of highly heterogeneous DWH systems exist which particularly vary in terms of applied data schemata and underlying terminologies. Inconsistencies between the generated reports of those systems as well as a diverging interpretation of the report results are therefore immediate consequences. As a result, the construction of a consolidated reporting system inevitably demands additional manual alignment effort. The thesis at hand is especially dedicated to information provided by multiple DWH systems. By means of the technologies of the Resource Description Framework (RDF) and the Web Ontology Language (OWL), which are established in the area of the semantic web, a framework is created to describe DWH metadata in a semantically comprehensive way. The metadata of different DWH systems marked in such a way are finally brought together in a semantic level of homogenisation (sHGS). With this tool, semantic relations between multiple DWH systems can be easily identified and their semantic heterogeneity can be overcome

QoS-Enabled B2B Integration

Business-To-Business Integration (B2Bi) is a key mechanism for enterprises to gain competitive advantage. However, developing B2Bi applications is far from trivial. Inter alia, agreement among integration partners about the business documents and the control flow of business document exchanges as well as applying suitable communication technologies for overcoming heterogeneous IT landscapes are major challenges. At the same time, choreography languages such as ebXML BPSS (ebBP), orchestration languages such as WS-BPEL and Web Services are promising to provide the foundations for seamless interactions among business partners. Automatically translating choreography agreements of integration partners into partner-specific orchestrations is an obvious idea for ensuring conformance of orchestration models to choreography models. Moreover, the application of such model-driven development methods facilitates productivity and cost-effectiveness whereas applying a service oriented architecture (SOA) based on WS-BPEL and Web Services leverages standardization and decoupling. By now, the realization of QoS attributes has not yet received the necessary attention that makes such approaches suitable for B2Bi. In this report, we describe a proof-of-concept implementation of the translation of ebBP choreographies into WS-BPEL orchestrations that respects B2Bi-relevant QoS attributes