Cross-Organizational Transaction Support for E-Services in Virtual Enterprises

In recent years, workflow management systems have become an accepted technology to support automation in process-centric environments. Lately, organizations concentrate more and more on their core business processes while outsourcing supporting processes to other organizations, thereby forming virtual enterprises. The organizations forming the virtual enterprise operate in a B2B e-commerce setting in which provider organizations perform e-services for consumer organizations. To apply workflow management technology in these virtual enterprises, current workflow management systems need to be extended to offer support for cross-organizational processes. Transaction support, already considered an important issue in intra-organizational workflow management systems, must be extended to deal with the cross-organizational aspects as well. This paper presents a high-level, compensation based transaction model and a flexible architecture to support thistransaction model, as required by cross-organizational workflow processes. Characteristic of the model is the flexibility in rollback semantics by combining rollback modes and rollback scopes. This is supported by a dynamically composed architecture that is configured using the agreements that are specified in an electronic contract that has been established between the participating organizations. The transaction model supported by the dynamically composed architecture is implemented in a prototype system, based on commercial workflow management technology.     

BPS工作流平台在协同办公系统中的应用

针对企业内部管理协作高效需求的日益凸显,介绍了普元工作流平台的参考模型。基于普元BPS工作流平台,构建了企业协同办公系统功能框架,并以企业核心业务发文处理流程为例,探讨了基于BPS工作流系统的流程设计过程,对构建信息共享和业务协同的高效企业具有重要意义。     

工作流技术在企业的应用研究

工作流就是可自动运行的业务流程。越来越多的企业正在扩展对工作流技术的应用，以优化其TQCS（时间、质量、成本、服务）。文章研究了工作流技术在企业中的应用历史、现状、趋势及价值，提出了一个面向服务的企业工作流管理系统模型。     

Process-oriented architectures for electronic commerce and interorganizational workflow

The Internet's World Wide Web has become the prime driver of contemporary Electronic commerce (E-commerce). Although the emphasis has moved from Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) to the Internet, the focus is still on the technology required to exchange information rather than supporting business processes crossing organizational borders. E-commerce is not just about facilitating individual business transactions, it also comprises the management of the causal relations between these transactions. This paper stresses the process aspect of E-commerce by relating it to workflow management. Traditional workflow management systems assume one centralized enactment service and have problems dealing with dynamic changes and local variations. Since E-commerce is characterized by interorganizational workflows distributed over autonomous business units, these systems tend to be useless in the context of E-commerce. This paper reviews new and existing architectures to enable interorganizational workflow. The presentation focuses on two approaches to partition an interorganizational workflow over multiple business partners. Both approaches are evaluated. One of the key concerns in this paper is the possibility to verify the correctness of the interorganizational workflow. The dynamics of the marketplace, with rapid changing business processes and relationships, underlines the need for verification tools.     

Standards-based approaches to B2B workflow integration

E-business automates the overall activities of a company and allows distributed systems to communicate their information. Process automation and information sharing improve a company’s productivity and responsiveness, while Business-to-Business (B2B) workflow systems electronically aid the progress of business processes among trading partners, and also help companies to monitor and administrate their process execution. This study analyzes the technologies and standards for B2B workflow integration, and extracts a reference model for B2B workflow integration. Based on the reference model, three approaches to B2B workflow integration will be introduced here. In addition, we have developed a prototype system of one approach and have illustrated an example for B2B workflow integration. The result of our research can help business partners understand the workflow standards and the messaging technologies for B2B workflow integration, and also help them understand how to implement workflow integration systems that are appropriate to their e-business environments.     

Building a production planning process with an approach based on CIMOSA and workflow management systems

Nowadays, one of the major challenges for enterprises is to stay competitive in today's changing market environment. This can be supported by business process models which on one hand are consistent and adequate (requirement #1), and on the other hand can be enacted and operated in an easy, fast, straightforward and integrated way (requirement #2). The CIMOSA architecture provides the basis for business process modelling to fulfil both of the above requirements. It supports the creation of consistent process models and allows to identify almost all the information required for the development of a workflow model. These models can be implemented using one of the commercial workflow management systems. In this paper we present the methodology based on the CIMOSA architecture that we have developed to build a workflow model in ©Lotus Notes for the forecasting and production planning processes in a tiles manufacturing enterprise. The CIMOSA approach has also been used to design the necessary software applications for processing the information of the resulting workflow system.     

基于BPEL4WS的工作流平台的设计和实现

随着市场竞争的全球化,企业必须能够对其业务过程进行快速重组,以提高自身竞争力,这使得其工作流问题受到了广泛的重视和研究。但是目前的工作流技术仍然不够成熟,尤其是业务过程涉及不同企业间的协作时,存在着互操作方面的诸多缺陷。Web服务的产生和发展很好地解决了这个难题,所以建立在Web服务基础上的BPEL4WS工作流技术弥补了当前工作流技术的不足,且已成为一种发展趋势。基于BPEL4WS设计和实现了一个工作流平台,并成功应用于攀钢的企业综合业务系统中。     

Using mobile agents to support interorganizational workflow management

This article argues that the mobile agent approach is well suited for sporadic communication in open distributed systems, especially for rather ''loose'' cooperations across local and organizational boundaries. In an increasing number of cases, management of distributed business procedures reaches beyond such boundaries. This means, for most existing workflow management systems, that cooperating partners are required to give up their local autonomy. However, for cases in which business partners intend to cooperate but still need to preserve their local autonomy, process participation on the basis of mobile agents represents an appropriate mechanism. This article shows how such process integration can be achieved. It also demonstrates how the Common Open Service Market (COSM) system software can be extended in order to use petri-net based process definitions that realize mobile agents in an integrated distributed system platform.     

一种基于SOA和JBPM的工作流引擎模型

工作流技术是实现业务流程自动化的关键技术,但现有的工作流技术已不能满足目前分布式异构和松散耦合的企业信息资源需求。利用SOA技术,结合JBPM,提出了一种基于SOA和JBPM的工作流引擎模型,并对其流程控制与任务管理进行了分析,最后,基于SOAP、WSDL协议和JPDL实现了此工作流引擎,证明了其有效性。     

基于工作流的通用备件管理系统设计

采用工作流技术,用户可以根据企业自身的实际业务流程来自定义工作流,从而实现业务流程的自动化。备件管理是每个企业都必须面对的环节,是企业ERP运行的重要组成部分。采用软件工程的方法,通过分析企业职能部门和用户的工作流程,结合工作流技术,按照特性要求和统一原则,采用层次化、组件化、松耦合思想设计并实现了通用型企业备件管理系统。     

WIRES: A Methodology for Developing Workflow Applications

Workflow management systems are becoming a relevant support for a large class of business applications, and many workflow models as well as commercial products are currently available. While the large availability of tools facilitates the development and the fulfilment of customer requirements, workflow application development still requires methodological guidelines that drive the developers in the complex task of rapidly producing effective applications. In fact, it is necessary to identify and model the business processes, to design the interfaces towards existing cooperating systems, and to manage implementation aspects in an integrated way. This paper presents the WIRES methodology for developing workflow applications under a uniform modelling paradigm – UML modelling tools with some extensions – that covers all the life cycle of these applications: from conceptual analysis to implementation. High-level analysis is performed under different perspectives, including a business and an organisational perspective. Distribution, interoperability and cooperation with external information systems are considered in this early stage. A set of “workflowability” criteria is provided in order to identify which candidate processes are suited to be implemented as workflows. Non-functional requirements receive particular emphasis in that they are among the most important criteria for deciding whether workflow technology can be actually useful for implementing the business process at hand. The design phase tackles aspects of concurrency and cooperation, distributed transactions and exception handling. Reuse of component workflows, available in a repository as workflow fragments, is a distinguishing feature of the method. Implementation aspects are presented in terms of rules that guide in the selection of a commercial workflow management system suitable for supporting the designed processes, coupled with guidelines for mapping the designed workflows onto the model offered by the selected system.     

Management of enterprise-wide systems integration programs

Automation and Information Systems play both tactical and strategic roles in the success of a business enterprise. They also pose an extremely challenging set of management issues concerned with the selection and management of technologies, management of the workforce to achieve successful implementation and operational use, and the integration of automation and information systems with business operations to capture the full benefits. Systems Integration programs involve high levels of technical and management risk commensurate with the significant business benefits that may be achieved. New and emerging automation and information technologies for Computer Integrated Manufacturing/Distribution, image processing, real-time transaction processing, and customer service cut across all organizational and functional units of an enterprise and require full system integration to capture their potential benefits. A wave of re-engineering programs are underway within commercial enterprises and the government to modify their business processes to take full competitive advantage of these technologies. There are numerous examples of both well managed and hopelessly mangled systems integration programs in both the public and private sectors that lead to the need for better management approaches. The management of software development has been a particularly troublesome area. This article presents a general model of the management structure to implement a systems integration program, using an enterprise-wide Information Systems Architecture (ISA) as a roadmap, and supported by a defined set of measures and metrics. Standards, although no panacea for systems integratio, play an important role in the architectural framework. The Information System Architecture approach described in this article is comprehensive in covering application software and data architecture as well as the computing and communications hardware infrastructure and other automation technologies that support the overall business process. The objective of the accompanying management model is to define a management structure, its essential functions, and methods that support a traditional systems development approach, as well as new approaches using prototyping and evolutionary development. Any of these management approaches require an ISA that is comprehensive in supporting business objectives, resilient in accommodating changing business conditions and technologies, and useful in producing a practical information architecture that can be applied to business operations. Examples of the ISA approach that support systems management are discussed for representative types of enterprise in the manufacturing sector and the service sector:

1. The Manufacturing/Distribution Enterprise example uses automated manufacturing and materials handling systems supported by MRPII software to integrate engineering, distribution, and financial systems; and
2. The Financial Services Enterprise example applies automated transaction processing using image processing and document management systems to achieve improved products and a more productive workflow with enhanced response to customers and/or clients.

     

Information supply for business processes: coupling workflow with document analysis and information retrieval

Explicit modeling of business processes and their enactment in workflow systems have proved to be valuable in increasing the efficiency of work in organizations. We argue that enacted business processes — i.e. workflow management systems — form a solid basis for adequate information support in complex and knowledge-intensive business processes. To support this claim we demonstrate results from two different projects.The VirtualOffice approach employs workflow-context information to support high-precision document analysis and understanding in standard office settings; the combination of workflow context and document analysis allows for the automatic handling of incoming paper mail with respect to the appropriate workflows.The KnowMore approach focuses on the support of people who work on knowledge-intensive tasks by automatic delivery of relevant and goal-specific information. To this end, workflow context, an extended process model, and a detailed modeling of information sources are combined.     

Pattern-based knowledge workflow automation: concepts and issues

As the result of business process automation, more and more knowledge is codified and stored in knowledge repositories and scattered in employees’ computers across functionally and geographically separated business units. While several alternative mechanisms such as chat rooms, search engines, recommender systems exist to retrieve and access knowledge, satisfying a knowledge requirement often involves the coordination of multiple tasks and the use of several technologies. However, there is no existing technology for orchestrating various collaboration, communication and information retrieval components to satisfy the knowledge needs in corporations. In order to address this gap, we propose the approach of pattern-based knowledge workflow that can enable the automation of knowledge flows across an organization. In this paper, we present an overview of the pattern-based knowledge workflow approach and propose extensions to the conventional workflow paradigm. We demonstrate the feasibility of implementing knowledge workflows by means of a Business Process Execution Language (BPEL) specification for executing knowledge workflows in a business setting. We then discuss the engineering challenges and research issues that need to be addressed to further develop this approach.

工作流系统在离散制造业的应用①

工作流技术通过对企业业务过程建模、业务过程管理和集成,规范企业业务流程,优化和重组企业业务,对促进企业管理规范化和信息化具有重要意义。Windows Work flow Foundation（以下简称WF）为开发基于工作流的应用程序提供了一个通用的框架,通过对WF框架的学习研究,结合在离散制造业的应用,开发了基于工作流的离散制造信息系统,提高了企业的工作效率和经济效益。     

基于办公自动化系统的工作流模型与算法设计

随着计算机科学的飞速发展,大多数企事业单位都实施了办公自动化系统(OA)。而工作流技术是实现业务过程管理自动化的核心技术。通过对业务流程建模和业务流程实体的建模分析,设计了基于Petri网办公自动化系统的工作流原型系统。在现有Petri网和WF-net理论的基础上,设计了工作流实现算法,研究并建立了办公自动化系统的精简工作流模型。     

A distributed server architecture supporting dynamic resource provisioning for BPM-oriented workflow management systems

Workflow management systems have been widely used in many business process management (BPM) applications. There are also a lot of companies offering commercial software solutions for BPM. However, most of them adopt a simple client/server architecture with one single centralized workflow-management server only. As the number of incoming workflow requests increases, the single workflow-management server might become the performance bottleneck, leading to unacceptable response time. Development of parallel servers might be a possible solution. However, a parallel server architecture with a fixed-number of servers cannot efficiently utilize computing resources under time-varying system workloads. This paper presents a distributed workflow-management server architecture which adopts dynamic resource provisioning mechanisms to deal with the probable performance bottleneck. We implemented a prototype system of the proposed architecture based on a commercial workflow management system, Agentflow. A series of experiments were conducted on the prototype system for performance evaluation. The experimental results indicate that the proposed architecture can deliver scalable performance and effectively maintain stable request response time under a wide range of incoming workflow request workloads.     

工作流技术在民航机场弱电信息系统中的应用

我国民航业正逐步向着与国际进一步接轨的方向发展,机构重组和重新分工将在未来的很长一段时间内不断进行。工作流技术提供了业务过程逻辑与计算机操作支持的分离,从而可以通过修改过程规则来重新定义业务过程,因此将工作流技术引入具有基于信息发布服务中间层的弱电信息系统中,能够避免由于上述原因带来的不必要的重复开发。首先对弱电信息系统的组成进行了分析,并介绍了工作流的建模内容;然后讨论了基于工作流的民航机场弱电信息系统的三种系统结构方案;最后给出了具有主控引擎的分布式原型系统的具体实现内容。     

Workflow Automation: Overview and Research Issues

Workflow management systems, a relatively recent technology, are designed to make work more efficient, integrate heterogeneous application systems, and support interorganizational processes in electronic commerce applications. In this paper, we introduce the field of workflow automation, the subject of this special issue of Information Systems Frontiers. In the first part of the paper, we provide basic definitions and frameworks to aid understanding of workflow management technologies. In the remainder of the paper, we discuss technical and management research opportunities in this field and discuss the other contributions to the special issue.