Transforming Business Process Models into
Run-time Implementations
----Enabling Programming at a Higher Level
Internship,
Department of Business Informatics, IBM
T. J. Watson Research Center,
In collaboration with Rainer Hauser (IBM Zurich
Research Lab) and Kamal Bhattachaya (IBM
T. J. Watson Research Center)
Business
analysts can use graphic business process modeling language such as UML and
business process modeling tool set such as IBM product WBI modeler to model
(i.e. program) their business operations. Such models have to be transformed
into executable code representations in the same way programs written in a high
level programming language are compiled into executable machine code. We
propose algorithms for transforming business process models (based either on
the paradigm of workflow or on the artifact-centric view) into executable code
written in structured programming languages.
The major problems we addressed in this
work are:
- The algorithm
generates logically optimal code from the business process model.
- The algorithm
preserves the natural structure of the model in the generated code.
- The algorithm has
solved a technical transformation challenge in which the process model is
irreducible.
- The algorithm is based
on the fact that we take the regular expression as the theoretical model
for the structure of structured programming languages
Case studies are based on:
- Transformation from
UML to BPEL
- Transformation from
Adaptive Business Object to BPEL
Two formal presentations delivered for
this project:
- “Compiling Large
Business Process Models: Untangle Unstructured Loops”, Summer intern project
review presentation, department of Business Informatics of IBM T. J.
Watson research center, August 2004.
2. “Transforming
Business Process Model into Run-time Implementation”, Final intern project
presentation, IBM T. J. Watson Research Center Hawthorne Auditorium, December
22, 2004.
Selected
publications on this work:
Wei Zhao, Jun-Jang Jeng, Lianjun An, Fei Cao,
Barrett R. Bryant, Rainer Hauser, Tao Tao, “Aligning
Business Processes with Enterprise Service Computing Infrastructure”, Chapter
2, pp. 25-57, Enterprise Service Computing: From Concept to Deployment, 2007.
Zhao, W., Bryant, B.R., Cao, F., Hauser, R.,
Bhattacharya, K. and Tao, T. (2007) ‘Transforming business process models in
the presence of irreducibility and concurrency’, Int. J. Business Process
Integration and Management, Vol. 2, No. 1, pp.37–48.
Zhao, W., Hauser, R., Bhattacharya, K., Bryant,
B.R. and Cao, F. (2006) ‘Compiling business processes: untangling unstructured
loops in irreducible flow graphs’, Int. J. Web and Grid Services, Vol. 2, No.
1, pp.68–91.
Wei Zhao, Kamal
Bhattacharya, Barrett R. Bryant, Fei Cao, Rainer Hauser, “Transforming
Business Process Models: Enabling Programming at a Higher Level”, The 2005 IEEE International Conference on
Services Computing (SCC'05), pp. 173-180, 2005. (acceptance ratio: 17%)
My internship would be so
boring without those two buddies: Pranam Kolari and Ralf Kramer
