Multi-agent collaboration for B2B workflow monitoring

Business-to-business (B2B) applications environments are exceedingly dynamic and competitive. This dynamism is manifested in the form of changing process requirements and time constraints. However, current workflow management technologies have difficulties to solve the challenges problems, such as: how to deal with the dynamic nature of B2B commerce processes, how to manage the distributed knowledge and recourses, and how to reduce the transaction risk. In this paper, a collaborative multi-agent system has been proposed. Multiple intelligent agents in our system can work together not only to identify the workflow problems, but also to solve such problems, by applying business rules, such as re-organizing the procurement and the transaction processes, and making necessary workflow process changes.     

基于Web的工作流管理系统:co-Flow

讨论Internet环境下协同产品开发的特征，研究它对工作流管理系统的要求，为适应这些要求，提出一些基于Web的工作流管理系统软件体系结构，并详细介绍了该系统中的基于XML的工作流过程定义和分布式流引擎间的互操作机制。该系统的软件原型“co-Flow”能够适应Internt环境下协同产品开发的需求。     

A model-driven workflow fragmentation framework for collaborative workflow architectures and systems

This paper focuses on a workflow distribution methodology for rationally deploying workflow models onto a distributed workflow system running on cloud computing environments, and we particularly lay a stress upon that those workflow systems operable on cloud computing environments are dubbed collaborative workflow systems, which are not only built upon the collaborative workflow architectures proposed in the paper, but pursuing the so-called collaborative computing paradigm characterized by focusing collaboration over cloud computing environments. The essential idea of the workflow distribution methodology is about how to fragment a workflow model and how to allocate its fragments to each of the architectural components configuring the underlying collaborative workflow architecture and system. As a reasonable solution to realize the essential idea, the paper proposes a model-driven workflow fragmentation framework, which provides a series of fragmentation algorithms that semantically fragmentate a workflow model by considering the semantic factors - performer, role, control-flow, data-flow, etc. - of the ICN-based workflow model as fragmentation criteria. The algorithms are classified into the vertical fragmentation approach, the horizontal fragmentation approach, and the hybrid approach of both. Conclusively, this paper conceives a possible set of collaborative workflow architectures embedding the collaborative computing paradigm, and describes the detailed formalism of the framework and about how the framework works on those collaborative workflow architectures and systems.     

Bundle and Pool Architecture for Multi-Language, Robust, Scalable Workflow Executions

In this paper, we leverage the previous work on the SHIWA bundling format and expand on this specification in order to facilitate workflow execution within a multi-workflow environment. We introduce a scalable and robust execution pool environment that supports workflows consisting of sub-workflows built upon a multitude of different workflow engines and environments, and also provide a common workflow representation for seamless connectivity through serialization to workflow bundles. We also present a meta-workflow scenario based upon this system. Workflow bundles employ the lightweight Open Archives Initiative Object Reuse and Exchange (ORE) Web-based standard, to provide a common format for representing and sharing workflows and the associated metadata required for their execution. This generalized bundling approach is already available within five workflow engines and has proven a useful environment for inter-workflow experimentation. The execution pool facilitates federated access to multiple distributed computing infrastructures supported by the underlying workflow engines subscribed to the pool. Workflow bundles are exposed using the eXtensible Messaging and Presence Protocol (XMPP), which provides the necessary communication backbone to enable multiple workflow engine agents to asynchronously publish and subscribe to bundles in meta-workflow pipelines. We present experiments showing the scalability and robustness of the pool execution approach with results showing that overheads remain controlled for up to 150 workflow agents, and that agent failures have very limited impact. We then demonstrate the applicability of our architecture by describing how a Java-based music analysis workflow can be distributed within such a multi-workflow environment consisting of the Triana and MOTEUR workflow engines.     

Model-as-you-go: An Approach for an Advanced Infrastructure for Scientific Workflows

Most of the existing scientific workflow systems rely on proprietary concepts and workflow languages. We are convinced that the conventional workflow technology that is established in business scenarios for years is also beneficial for scientists and scientific applications. We are therefore working on a scientific workflow system based on business workflow concepts and technologies. The system offers advanced flexibility features to scientists in order to support them in creating workflows in an explorative manner and to increase robustness of scientific applications. We named the approach Model-as-you-go because it enables users to model and execute workflows in an iterative process that eventually results in a complete scientific workflow. In this paper, we present main ingredients of Model-as-you-go, show how existing workflow concepts have to be extended in order to cover the requirements of scientists, discuss the application of the concepts to BPEL, and introduce the current prototype of the system.     

基于工作流的高速公路养护系统的设计与实现

高速公路养护工作因为其数据复杂、业务变化频繁而较难管理。同时市场竞争与用户的压力在不断促使管理求变,因此高速公路养护管理系统不得不快速适应这种不断变化的需求。由于使用工作流技术构建的信息系统具有很好的灵活性、良好的可扩展能力等,利用工作流技术来实现高速公路养护管理系统是非常好的选择。本文对如何利用工作流技术来实现一个养护管理系统作了详细的分析与设计,并对采用工作流技术带来的优点作了详细的分析。实践证明了本系统的设计思想是有意义的,并对开发同类系统具有参考价值。     

基于工作流的高速公路养护系统的设计与实现

高速公路养护工作因为其数据复杂、业务变化频繁而较难管理。同时市场竞争与用户的压力在不断促使管理求变，因此高速公路养护管理系统不得不快速适应这种不断变化的需求。由于使用工作流技术构建的信息系统具有很好的灵活性、良好的可扩展能力等，利用工作流技术来实现高速公路养护管理系统是非常好的选择。本文对如何利用工作流枝术来实现一个养护管理系统作了详细的分析与设计，并对采用工作流技术带来的优．最作了详细的分析。实践证明了本系统的设计思想是有意义的，并对开发同类系统具有参考价值。     

面向钢铁集团测量过程的工作流设计

为实现钢铁集团测量过程的流程化管理,提出一种基于扩展有限状态机的工作流元模型,给出元模型的元素定义与迁移原理。根据ISO10012测量过程的受控条件,利用该模型对测量过程进行工作流与角色权限设计,实现基于浏览器/服务器的3层工作流系统。结果表明,该系统能满足测量过程的7个受控条件。     

A Knowledge-based Approach to Handling Exceptions in Workflow Systems

This paper describes a novel knowledge-based approachfor helping workflow process designers andparticipants better manage the exceptions (deviationsfrom an ideal collaborative work process caused byerrors, failures, resource or requirements changesetc.) that can occur during the enactment of aworkflow. This approach is based on exploiting ageneric and reusable body of knowledge concerning whatkinds of exceptions can occur in collaborative workprocesses, and how these exceptions can handled(detected, diagnosed and resolved). This work buildsupon previous efforts from the MIT Process Handbookproject and from research on conflict management incollaborative design.     

工作流管理系统WFlow中协同建模工具的研究

在传统的工作流管理系统中建模工具一般只支持单用户工作,工作流模型由专业建模人员来建立。随着工作流管理系统应用领域和应用规模的不断扩大,其所管理的企业业务流程已不可能只局限在企业中的一个小部门内部,而是一些跨部门跨企业的业务流程,这些流程只靠单个专业 建模人员已经很难完成其工作流模型的建立,它需要不同人员的分工合作,充分利用各自的专业知识共同来完成其工作流模型的建立。为此,开发了工作流管理系统－－Wflow,就其协同建模工具进行了研讨。     

The data grid: Towards an architecture for the distributed management and analysis of large scientific datasets

In an increasing number of scientific disciplines, large data collections are emerging as important community resources. In this paper, we introduce design principles for a data management architecture called the data grid. We describe two basic services that we believe are fundamental to the design of a data grid, namely, storage systems and metadata management. Next, we explain how these services can be used to develop higher-level services for replica management and replica selection. We conclude by describing our initial implementation of data grid functionality.     

A mashup based framework for multi level healthcare interoperability

Healthcare delivery is evolving from disease-centered to patient-centered care delivery where patients are active participants in their healthcare delivery. This calls for more communication and collaboration among all healthcare actors. There is also an increasing demand for personalized healthcare systems that provide effective information management, facilitate communication and collaboration, and support applications to meet user requirements. To address these challenges, we need to advance the integration and interoperability of healthcare applications in a controlled manner. Drawing upon a conceptual model from a collaborative care case study, we identified a set of interoperability requirements and developed a Mashup based interoperability framework. Our framework allows patients and other healthcare actors to engage in collaborative processes through online applications facilitated by mashups. We then use proof-of-concept implementations to demonstrate how our framework is able to facilitate different types of interoperability. We believe that collaborative technologies such as mashups can implement process interoperability requirements to support collaborative care delivery, particularly for asynchronous care delivery.     

模糊定时高级Petri网的协同设计活动建模和分析

利用模糊定时高级Petri网和工作流技术对协同设计活动进行建模和分析，定义了评估和推理规则，解决了协同设计中对不确定性时间参数的管理，并能够实现对协同设计的时间验证，特别是对协同设计时间的定量分析，最后举例说明了如何建立相应的模糊Petri网模型，并对其性能进行分析推理。     

The design of a JADE-based autonomous workflow management system for collaborative SoC design

Given a fast changing electronics goods marketplace, designers of integrated circuits and components need to be more competitive, efficient, flexible, and use collaborative workflow to reduce time-to-market and a project’s life cycle. In recent years, agent-based workflow management systems (WfMS) have been widely used to monitor and control business design processes. In this paper, intelligent agents are applied to the collaborative system-on-chip (SoC) design environment. The proposed JADE-based autonomous workflow management system (JAWMS) uses a workflow coordination mechanism and an agent integration mechanism to enable the analysis, management and interaction of automated design processes. The workflow coordination mechanism uses five domain specific agents to perform the workflow enactment services and a generic agent to control the system flow logic. The system kernel of JAWMS follows the specifications of the workflow reference model provided by the workflow management coalition (WfMC). The agent integration mechanism supports an agent to interact with other JADE-based agent platforms and to coordinate and monitor workflow coordination messages. All agents are written in the Java language using the JADE platform and work together to perform flexible, adaptive and dynamic design tasks in an autonomous and collaborative way. JAWMS facilitates SoC design and team interaction in a collaborative but distributed product development environment.     

3G商城工作流引擎的研究与可行性分析

本文针对公司的实际需要,论述了工作流管理系统的设计与实现。首先文章对工作流定义、工作流系统组成、如何设计和实施工作流系统做了较为详细的介绍,给出了一个设计和实施工作流系统的参考模型,论述了三类组件的功能和实施技术。其次,描述了工作流管理系统的需求分析,包括环境需求、系统需求、系统安全、体系结构等。通过引入工作流的概念,介绍了工作流管理系统的设计过程。论述了3G商城工作流参考模型的工作原理以及如何通过工作流实现。     

传统工作流管理系统在电子商务应用中的改进

分析了传统商业过程与电子商务活动过程的区别，阐述了传统工作流技术在电子商务活动中应用的局限性，提出了一种改进传统工作流管理系统的方法。总结了这种改进方法的优点并提出了未来的发展趋势。     

An e‐Science data infrastructure for simulations within Grid computing environment: methods,approaches and practice

Grid‐based simulation usually involves large quantities of data at each stage of the simulation process. These data include simulation input and output files, intermediate results files, log and error files, associated metadata, and information capturing the processes that generate the data. The question of how to effectively store and manage data files within a Grid computing environment is increasingly becoming an important issue. This paper illustrates how we built a lightweight e‐Science infrastructure for data management within a Grid computing environment, including the integration of data curation activities into the entire Grid‐based simulation process. Rather than focusing on specific implementation details, we aim to identify the key issues and research challenges, describing how various existing technologies and tools can be best integrated to address these requirements and challenges. Although the case of quantum mechanical simulation of materials properties is used in the paper, much of the discussion is as generic as possible so that approaches, methods and practice (e.g. integrated approach, workflow taxonomy and development approach, simple but useful semantic annotation approach) can be applied to wider domains and disciplines to facilitat the digital research. A comparison between our approach and Cloud computing, and lessons learned in data management within the Grid computing environment, are also presented. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Virtual workflow system for distributed collaborative scientific applications on Grids

Grid computing has become an effective computing technique in recent years. This paper develops a virtual workflow system to construct distributed collaborative applications for Grid users. The virtual workflow system consists three levels: abstract workflow system, translator and concrete workflow system. The research highlight of the implementation is that this workflow system is developed based on CORBA and Unicore Grid middleware. Furthermore, this implementation can support legacy application developed with Parco and C++ codes. This virtual workflow system can provide efficient GUI for users to organize distributed scientific collaborative applications and execute them on Grid resources. We present the design, implementation, and evaluation of this virtual workflow system in the paper.