基于人工智能的BPR技术在企业建模中的应用

采用基于AI的BPR建模方法——i*模型建立企业业务模型。分析了SD模型与SR模型的meta-model以及形式化表达和图形描述,并给出i*模型用于企业建模的框架、步骤和例子。i*模型基于意图性分析,解决了企业BPR中战略意图难以与业务流程相结合的问题,是对现有BPR技术的发展。     

The importance of business process modeling in software systems design

Despite diligent efforts made by the software engineering community, the failure of software projects keeps increasing at an alarming rate. After two decades of this problem reoccurring, one of the leading causes for the high failure rate is still poor process modeling (requirements’ specification). Therefore both researchers and practitioners recognize the importance of business process modeling in understanding and designing accurate software systems. However, lack of direct model checking (verification) feature is one of the main shortcomings in conventional process modeling methods. It is important that models provide verifiable insight into underlying business processes in order to design complex software systems such as Enterprise Information Systems (EIS). The software engineering community has been deploying the same methods that have haunted the industry with failure. In this paper, we try to remedy this issue by looking at a non-conventional framework. We introduce a business process modeling method that is amenable to automatic analysis (simulation), yet powerful enough to capture the rich reality of business systems as enacted in the behavior and interactions of users. The proposed method is based on the innovative language-action perspective.     

VIVACE: A framework for the systematic evaluation of variability support in process-aware information systems

ContextThe increasing adoption of process-aware information systems (PAISs) such as workflow management systems, enterprise resource planning systems, or case management systems, together with the high variability in business processes (e.g., sales processes may vary depending on the respective products and countries), has resulted in large industrial process model repositories. To cope with this business process variability, the proper management of process variants along the entire process lifecycle becomes crucial.ObjectiveThe goal of this paper is to develop a fundamental understanding of business process variability. In particular, the paper will provide a framework for assessing and comparing process variability approaches and the support they provide for the different phases of the business process lifecycle (i.e., process analysis and design, configuration, enactment, diagnosis, and evolution).MethodWe conducted a systematic literature review (SLR) in order to discover how process variability is supported by existing approaches.ResultsThe SLR resulted in 63 primary studies which were deeply analyzed. Based on this analysis, we derived the VIVACE framework. VIVACE allows assessing the expressiveness of a process modeling language regarding the explicit specification of process variability. Furthermore, the support provided by a process-aware information system to properly deal with process model variants can be assessed with VIVACE as well.ConclusionsVIVACE provides an empirically-grounded framework for process engineers that enables them to evaluate existing process variability approaches as well as to select that variability approach meeting their requirements best. Finally, it helps process engineers in implementing PAISs supporting process variability along the entire process lifecycle.     

Multi-model driven collaborative development platform for service-oriented e-Business systems

Enterprises need to be responsive to meet dynamic businesses and requirements. Service-oriented architecture and Web services can improve e-Business systems to be integrated and flexible. This paper proposes a multi-model driven collaborative development platform for service-oriented e-Business systems. The platform provides engineers/consultants with three views, i.e., business view, process view, and service view to support service-oriented software engineering, top-down business design and bottom-up service composite and development. The views are kept consistent through model-driven translation mechanisms. The platform employs three models, i.e., service meta-model, process model and business model to implement the translation. On the platform, business and technical consultants/engineers can use the views designated for their roles to collaborate for a service-oriented e-Business system based at the distributed sites of, e.g., IT vendors and their clients. The collaboration is featured with visual development and rapid demonstration. Comparingly, most of the mainstream development environments focus on object-oriented application development other than service-oriented business process modeling. The platform has been developed and deployed in an innovation centre to be evaluated by visiting customers.     

E-MEMO: a method to support the development of customized electronic commerce systems

In many industries structural change through E-Commerce is challenging firms to re-align their strategies as well as re-engineer their business processes with new competitive environments while taking advantage of technological opportunities. This article presents E-MEMO, a method for multi-perspective enterprise modelling with special emphasis on processes and technologies for E-Commerce. It serves to analyse and design corporate information systems that are balanced with a company’s E-Commerce strategy and its organisation. E-MEMO offers specific languages for modelling strategies, business processes, and related resources. In addition to that, it provides a library of reference models including strategy networks to guide strategic planning and models of business processes. In order to further support the implementation of information systems a transformation has been defined that allows for generating workflow schemata from business process models. Since design-oriented research is not predominant in the Information Systems field, the epistemological challenges of the chosen research approach are discussed, too.     

Six types of IT-business strategic alignment: an investigation of the constructs and their measurement

Top management has been concerned with IT-business strategic alignment (hereafter referred to as alignment) for the past 30 years. Consequently, alignment researchers have developed many models to explain how alignment generates value for firms. However, these models use inconsistent definitions and measures of alignment, which has led to conflicting results and has potentially inhibited the progress of research on this critical topic. This paper emphasizes the importance of demarcating the six alignment types that are sometimes confused in the literature into a single, unified model. It also reports on the development of definitions and measures of these six types of alignment including alignment between IT and business strategies (i.e., intellectual alignment), between IT and business infrastructures and processes (i.e., operational alignment), and across these two domains such that strategies are linked with infrastructures and processes (i.e., four types of cross-domain alignment). Analyzing survey data collected from 140 Chief Information Officers, we found each measure possesses desirable psychometric properties. Implications for theory and practice are discussed.     

Recommendation-based editor for business process modeling

To ensure proper and efficient modeling of business processes, it is important to support users of process editors adequately. With only minimal modeling support, the productivity of novice business process modelers may be low when starting process modeling. In this article, we present a theoretically sound and empirically validated recommendation-based modeling support system, which covers different aspects of business process modeling. We consider basic functionality, such as an intuitive search interface, as well as advanced concepts like patterns observed in other users' preferences. Additionally, we propose a multitude of interaction possibilities with the recommendation system, e.g., different metrics that can be used in isolation or an overall recommender component that combines several sub metrics into one comprehensive score. We validate a prototype implementation of the recommendation system with exhaustive user experiments based on real-life process models. To our knowledge, this is the only comprehensive recommendation system for business process modeling that is available.     

Geschäftsmodelle

The business model concept, although a relatively new topic for research, has garnered growing attention over the past decade. Whilst it has been robustly defined, the concept has so far attracted very little substantive research. In the context of the wide-spread digitization of businesses and society at large, the logic inherent in a business model has become critical for business success and, hence, a focus for academic inquiry. The business model concept is identified as the missing link between business strategy, processes, and Information Technology (IT). The authors argue that the BISE community offers distinct and unique competencies (e.g., translating business strategies into IT systems, managing business and IT processes, etc.) that can be harnessed for significant research contributions to this field. Within this research gap three distinct streams are delineated, namely, business models in IT industries, IT enabled or digital business models, and IT support for developing and managing business models. For these streams, the current state of the art, suggest critical research questions, and suitable research methodologies are outlined.     

Automating ETL processes using the domain-specific modeling approach

The development of Extract–Transform–Load (ETL) processes is the most complex, time-consuming and expensive phase of data warehouse development. Yet, the dynamics of modern business systems demand a more agile and flexible approach to their development. As a result, current research in this area is focused on ETL process conceptualization and the automation of ETL process development. This paper proposes a novel solution for automating ETL processes using the domain-specific modeling (DSM) approach. The proposed solution is based on the formal specification of ETL processes and the implementation of such formal specifications. Thus, in accordance with the DSM approach, several new domain-specific languages (DSLs) are introduced, each defining concepts relevant for a specific aspect of an ETL process. The focus of this paper is the actual implementation of the formal specification of an ETL process. To this end, a specific ETL platform (ETL-PL) is introduced to technologically support both the modeling of ETL processes (i.e., the creation of models in accordance with the introduced DSLs) and the automated transformation of the created models into the executable code of a specific application framework (representing ETL-PL’s execution environment). It should be emphasized that ETL-PL actually presumes the dynamic execution of ETL models or, more precisely, the executable code is generated at runtime. Thus the execution environment consists of code generator components and the components implementing the application framework. ETL-PL has been implemented as an extension of the .NET platform.     

Semantic business process integration based on ontology alignment

Innovation and agility should be provided to businesses by efficient collaboration (i.e., communication and sharing) between them. However, semantic heterogeneity between business processes is a serious problem for automatically supporting cooperation processes (e.g., knowledge sharing and querying-based interactions) between businesses. In order to overcome this problem, we propose a novel framework based on aligning business ontologies for integrating heterogeneous business processes. We can consider two types of alignment processes; (i) manual alignment for building a whole business process ontology in a business process management (BPM) system and (ii) automated alignment between business processes of different BPM systems. Thereby, the optimal integration between two business processes has to be discovered to maximize the summation of a set of partial similarities between semantic components consisting of the business processes. In particular, the semantic component are extracted from semantic annotations of business processes. For evaluating the proposed system, we have conducted experimentations by using 22 business process management systems, which are organized as six business alliances. We have assumed that business processes in a same BPM system should be built with a common ontologies. The proposed alignment method has shown about 71.3% of precision (65.4% of recall). In addition, we found out that alignment results are dependent on some characteristics of ontologies (e.g., depth and number of classes).     

Complexity metrics for Workflow nets

Process modeling languages such as EPCs, BPMN, flow charts, UML activity diagrams, Petri nets, etc., are used to model business processes and to configure process-aware information systems. It is known that users have problems understanding these diagrams. In fact, even process engineers and system analysts have difficulties in grasping the dynamics implied by a process model. Recent empirical studies show that people make numerous errors when modeling complex business processes, e.g., about 20% of the EPCs in the SAP reference model have design flaws resulting in potential deadlocks, livelocks, etc. It seems obvious that the complexity of the model contributes to design errors and a lack of understanding. It is not easy to measure complexity, however. This paper presents three complexity metrics that have been implemented in the process analysis tool ProM. The metrics are defined for a subclass of Petri nets named Workflow nets, but the results can easily be applied to other languages. To demonstrate the applicability of these metrics, we have applied our approach and tool to 262 relatively complex Protos models made in the context of various student projects. This allows us to validate and compare the different metrics. It turns out that our new metric focusing on the structuredness outperforms existing metrics.     

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。     

A Decision Model for Strategic Evaluation of Enterprise Information Technologies

Enterprise information technologies (EITs), which are strategic systems seeking to integrate the processes and databases of the entire organization and beyond, require a significant investment of money and human resources in return for the promise of a global business model and its associated far-reaching benefits. Their evaluation/justification must be completed with organizational goals and requirements included in the decision, or the organization could lose financially and competitively. Besides traditional financial models, e.g., ROI (return on investment), that are primarily meant for short-term financial justification purposes, there is a paucity of methods for the evaluation of the strategic and intangible costs and benefits that EITs afford organizations as a whole. This article introduces the use of a robust quantitative technique called the analytical hierarchy process (AHP) that can integrate a diverse range of factors (strategic and operational, and tangible and intangible) into one model. the approach can be easily understood by managers and analysts and has a history of application to other types of strategic justification decisions.     

Hybrid system modeling using the SIMANLib and ARENALib Modelica libraries

The ARENALib and SIMANLib Modelica libraries replicate the basic functionality of the Arena simulation environment and the SIMAN language. These libraries facilitate describing discrete-event models using the Arena modeling methodology. ARENALib and SIMANLib models can be combined with other Modelica models in order to describe complex hybrid systems (i.e., combined continuous-time and discrete-event systems). The implementation and design of SIMANLib and ARENALib is discussed. The ARENALib components have been built in a modular fashion using SIMANLib. The SIMANLib components have been described as Parallel DEVS models and implemented using DEVSLib, a Modelica library previously developed by the authors to support the Parallel DEVS formalism. The use of Parallel DEVS as underlying mathematical formalism has facilitated the development and maintenance of SIMANLib. The modeling of two hybrid systems is discussed to illustrate the features and use of SIMANLib and ARENALib: firstly, a soaking-pit furnace; secondly, the malaria spread and an emergency hospital. DEVSLib, SIMANLib and ARENALib can be freely downloaded from http://www.euclides.dia.uned.es/.     

Business process compliance checking – applying and evaluating a generic pattern matching approach for conceptual models in the financial sector

Given the strong increase in regulatory requirements for business processes the management of business process compliance becomes a more and more regarded field in IS research. Several methods have been developed to support compliance checking of conceptual models. However, their focus on distinct modeling languages and mostly linear (i.e., predecessor-successor related) compliance rules may hinder widespread adoption and application in practice. Furthermore, hardly any of them has been evaluated in a real-world setting. We address this issue by applying a generic pattern matching approach for conceptual models to business process compliance checking in the financial sector. It consists of a model query language, a search algorithm and a corresponding modelling tool prototype. It is (1) applicable for all graph-based conceptual modeling languages and (2) for different kinds of compliance rules. Furthermore, based on an applicability check, we (3) evaluate the approach in a financial industry project setting against its relevance for decision support of audit and compliance management tasks.     

Integrated hydrodynamic models of oil field development processes

We consider the problems of designing integrated mathematical models for stratum fluids filtration and gas-liquid mixture flows (i.e., oil, natural gas, and water) in oil- and gas-gathering pipelines. The modeling process lies in finding a generalized solution to an initial boundary problem for a system of equations describing real physical processes in oil and gas strata, shafts, and ground-based gathering pipelines. We suggest and study methods to solve the systems of nonlinear algebraic equations defined by the space-time approximation of the initial boundary problems belonging to the class considered.     

Modeling and analysis of fault-tolerant systems for machining operations based on Petri nets

This paper introduces a methodology for modeling and analyzing fault-tolerant manufacturing systems that not only optimizes normal productive processes, but also performs detection and treatment of faults. This approach is based on the hierarchical and modular integration of Petri nets. The modularity provides the integration of three types of processes: those representing the productive process, fault detection, and fault treatment. The hierarchical aspect of the approach allows us to consider processes on different levels of detail (i.e., factory, manufacturing cell, or machine). Case studies considering detection and treatment of faults are presented, and a simulation tool is applied to verify the models.     

Components of a multi-perspective modeling method for designing and managing IT security systems

Information technology (IT) security design and management are a major concern and substantial challenge for IT management. Today’s highly complex business and technological environments and the need to effectively communicate and justify IT security requirements and controls demand methodical support. The modeling method presented in this paper addresses this demand. The method is based on the assumption that enriched enterprise models integrating technological, business, organizational and strategic aspects provide an effective foundation for developing and managing IT security systems and facilitating communication and understanding between stakeholders. The proposed modeling method for designing and managing IT security in organizations accounts for different perspectives and is based on multi-perspective enterprise modeling. The core components of the method, based on analysis of requirements at different levels of abstraction, are: modeling language concepts specifically designed to address security issues, process models that guide the use of the resulting language, and a modeling environment. The method facilitates elaborate representations of the various aspects of IT security at different levels of abstraction and covers the entire lifecycle of IT security systems. It not only supports multi-perspective requirement analysis and design but also enables monitoring and analysis of IT security at runtime. The presented artifact is evaluated with recourse to a research method that enables the configuration of multi-criteria justification procedures.     

Process modeling and analysis of manufacturing supply chain networks using object-oriented Petri nets

This paper presents a systematic methodology for modeling and analysis of manufacturing supply chain business processes. The proposed approach first employs Computer Integrated Manufacturing Open System Architecture (CIMOSA) behavior rules to model the business process routing structures of manufacturing supply chain networks. Object-oriented predicate/transition nets (OPTNs) are then developed for the modular modeling and analysis of process models. Based on the structure of OPTNs, a procedure to obtain the system's P-invariants through objects’ P-invariants is suggested. From the P-invariants obtained, system structural properties such as deadlock and overflow can be analyzed. By using Petri net unfolding techniques and by extracting the process model of each object from the entire process model, the sequencing analysis for operations in supply chain processes becomes possible. Several manufacturing supply chain examples are used to illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed method.