Addressing inter-organisational process flexibility using versions: The VP2M approach

Process flexibility has been investigated in depth in the context of intra-organisational processes, but it is still an open issue when processes cross the boundaries of companies. In this paper, we address the modelling of flexible inter-organisational processes using a version-based approach. Indeed, versions are known to be a powerful technique to deal with variability, evolution and adaptation of processes, which are the three main needs of process flexibility. More precisely, this paper presents VP2M (Version of Process Meta-Model), a meta-model supporting the modelling of versions of inter-organisational processes, addressing both static and dynamic aspects of VP2M. It also illustrates process version modelling within the Subsea Pipeline process example

Modelling Flexible Collaborative Process: The VCP2M Approach

This paper addresses the collaborative processes flexibility issue, which is an important issue in Business Process (BP) Management. Indeed, the strong competition in which organizations are involved lead them to frequently change and adapt their collaborative processes to face new client requirements or to benefit from new collaboration opportunities. More precisely, this paper proposes to adopt a version-based approach to support the modelling of flexible collaborative processes. First it introduces the VBP2M meta-model (Version of BP meta-model) supporting the modelling of flexible internal (i.e., intra-organizational) processes, and then explains how to extend it to define the VCP2M meta-model (Version of Collaborative Processes meta-model) to design flexible collaborative processes, which correspond to processes crossing the boundaries of companies. A specific case study illustrates the modelling of collaborative process versions as instances of VCP2M

Addressing inter-organisational process flexibility using versions: The VP2M approach

Process flexibility has been investigated in depth in the context of intra-organisational processes, but it is still an open issue when processes cross the boundaries of companies. In this paper, we address the modelling of flexible inter-organisational processes using a version-based approach. Indeed, versions are known to be a powerful technique to deal with variability, evolution and adaptation of processes, which are the three main needs of process flexibility. More precisely, this paper presents VP2M (Version of Process Meta-Model), a meta-model supporting the modelling of versions of inter-organisational processes, addressing both static and dynamic aspects of VP2M. It also illustrates process version modelling within the Subsea Pipeline process example

Autonomic Protocol-based Coordination in Dynamic Inter-Organizational Workflow

Given the maturity of Internet standards, inter-organizational workflow is expected to be deployed in environments that are more dynamic and open than before. This paper addresses Inter Organizational Workflow (IOW) coordination in such a context, mainly investigating autonomic coordination managed at run-time. It is based on the idea that an agent-based approach is suitable to deal with this issue. More precisely, this paper introduces a framework for dynamic IOW in which involved processes are encapsulated into agents, called Process Agents (PA) in order to give them the capability to autonomously decide with whom, when and how to cooperate, and in which involved processes can access protocol components for their coordination needs. Our approach is based on the capability of PAs in playing different coordination protocols in order to take part in new business opportunities. This solution has numerous advantages. First, it provides extendable and reusable coordination components. Then, it supports run-time protocol integration. Finally, it eases openness since it imposes very few constraints

A Version-based Approach to Address Flexibility of BPMN Collaborations and Choreographies

Process flexibility is an important issue in the business process management area: it has mainly been investigated in the context of intra-organisational processes but it received little attention in the context of processes crossing the boundaries of companies. This paper addresses the issue of BPMN collaborations and choreographies flexibility, advocating a version-based approach. Indeed versions, which have been recognised as a powerful mechanism to face flexibility of internal processes of companies, are used to address flexibility of processes crossing the boundaries of companies, modelled as collaborations or choreographies in BPMN. Thus this paper extends BPMN collaborations using versions. It also introduces algorithms supporting the mapping from versions of collaborations into versions of choreographies. This paper mainly focuses on static aspects of collaboration and choreography versioning

Self-adaptive Aided Decision-making - Application to Maritime Surveillance

Information required for decision-making in complex applications, such as flood forecast or maritime surveillance, can be represented using a mathematical function. However, due to the complexity of the considered applications and their dynamics, the parameters involved in the mathematical function can be hard to value a priori. This paper presents a Multi-Agent System, called PaMAS (Parameter Multi-Agent System) that is able to learn such parameters values on the fly, autonomously, cooperatively and by self-adaptation. It also illustrates the application of PaMAS in the context of the maritime surveillance European project I2C. It finally provides an evaluation of the PaMAS learning

A Graphic Tool for Complex and Multimedia Database Querying

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