An Exploratory Case Study of the Benefits of Business Rules Management Systems

Business rules engines and business rule management systems (BRMS) are gaining popularity especially in large, complex, and real-time business environments. In essence, the business rules approach represents a new paradigm for compartmentalizing the formalization of business policies and rules as a separate component from application code. Given that this phenomenon has not yet been empirically investigated from a research perspective, we report on an exploratory case study undertaken to better understand the impacts of the business rules approach on activities throughout the software development lifecycle at a large Fortune 500 corporation. Our study integrates theoretical notions from the literature on knowledge reuse and systems theory with four constructs – centralization, standardization, externalization and structuration – to categorize the benefits arising from BRMS. Our results suggest that the application of the business rules approach has the potential to facilitate information systems development activities at all stages of the software development lifecycle

Dynamic Validation Logic Generation using Business Rules Management Systems

Input validation in web applications represents an important part of their functionality. With proper validation we ensure that provided input data is in accordance with technical constraints, defined by the developer and with business-related constraints. In web development frameworks, validation logic is coupled with program code. If one validation rule is changed, application needs to be recompiled and redeployed. In this thesis we developed a system for input validation based on business rules management system. Validation rules are stored in central repository, separated from implementation of web applications. Thus, we have achieved a simple and transparent way of declaring validation logic in the form of declarative business rules as well as simplifed applications maintenance in case of changes in validation logic

Introduction to the special issue on the International Web Rule Symposia 2012–2014

The annual International Web Rule Symposium (RuleML) is an international conference on research, applications, languages, and standards for rule technologies. It has evolved from an annual series of international workshops since 2002, international conferences in 2005 and 2006, and international symposia since 2007. It is the flagship event of the Rule Markup and Modeling Initiative (RuleML, http://ruleml.org), a nonprofit umbrella organization of several technical groups from academia, industry, and government working on rule technology and its applications. RuleML is the leading conference to build bridges between academia and industry in the field of rules and its applications, especially as part of the semantic technology stack. It is devoted to rule-based programming and rule-based systems including production rules systems, logic programming rule engines, and business rules engines/business rules management systems; Semantic Web rule languages and rule standards (e.g., RuleML, SWRL, RIF, PRR, SBVR, DMN, CL, Prolog); rule-based event processing languages and technologies; and research on inference rules, transformation rules, decision rules, production rules, and ECA rules

Implementation of business rules using business rules management system

In this thesis we present Business Rules Management Systems (BRMS) and their history, general structure, advantages and disadvantages. We describe different methods of software development with the help of these systems and two principal methodologies. Business rules are also presented along with some basic definitions, classifications and most frequently used record formats. Generally, companies do not have all their business rules assembled, therefore, methods for gathering all business rules are described. We also introduced some commonly used commercial and open source BRMS products. At the end we provide a description of the process of implementation of business rules, which was done by using Drools technology

Business rules management: Identification of alternative solutions

The actual competitive business environment, requires that organizations have at their disposal flexible applications that can be easily adapted to attend the changing business requirements. In this context, business rules management is increasingly being perceived as relevant by the Information Systems development teams, due to the multiple benefits that come from its implementation. Anyway, the so-called Business Rules Management Systems (BRMS) are not presently seen by organizations as essential for their survival, as the adoption of these systems tends to be a long and expensive process. However, some other solutions began to appear which might be considered alternatives to these systems. Indeed, the widespread use of BPMS (Business Processes Management Systems), some of them already offering BPMN (Business Processes Model and Notation) enriched with DMN (Decision Model and Notation) and CMMN (Case Management Model and Notation), may threaten the actual dominance of the management rules area by the present BRMS. Which raises the following question: "In the future, will BPMS make BRMS superfluous by also support the management of business rules?"O ambiente de negócios competitivo da atualidade, exige que as organizações tenham ao seu dispor aplicações flexíveis, que possam ser rapidamente adaptadas às alterações nos requisitos do negócio. Neste âmbito, a gestão de regras de negócio está a ser encarada com cada vez maior relevância pelas equipas de desenvolvimento de Sistemas de Informação, dados os múltiplos benefícios subjacentes à sua implementação. Em todo o caso, os chamados sistemas de gestão de regras de negócio (BRMS – Business Rules Management Systems) ainda não são encarados pelas organizações como a forma de garantir a tão desejada agilidade das suas TI, pois a adoção deste tipo de sistemas tende a ser um processo demorado e dispendioso. No entanto, começaram a aparecer outras soluções que podem constituir-se como alternativas a estes sistemas. De facto, a grande divulgação dos sistemas BPMS (Business Processes Management Systems), em que começam a surgir sistemas que já disponibilizam a linguagem BPMN (Business Processes Model and Notation) enriquecida com a DMN (Decision Model and Notation) e a CMMN (Case Management Model and Notation), podem colocar em risco o domínio na área da gestão de regras de negócio dos atuais BRMS, levantando a seguinte questão: “No futuro, permitirão os BPMS tornar supérfluos os BRMS ao suportarem também a gestão de regras de negócio?COMPETE: POCI-01-0145-FEDER-007043 and FCT – Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia within the Project Scope: UID/CEC/00319/201