an application of role modelling to the decomposition of business processes

An Application of Role Modelling to the Decomposition of Business Processes

Artur Caetano, José Borbinha, José Tribolet

Dep. of Computer Science and Engineering, IST, Technical University of Lisbon&Information Systems Group, INESC-ID Lisbon

artur.caetano@ist.utl.pt

CONFENIS 2012. September 2012, Ghent, Belgium.

SummaryResearch questions

– How to decompose a business process according to

specific criteria?

– How to identify the atomic activities of a business

process (the activities that cannot be further

decomposed)?

Goals

– Create consistent views over the process model.

– Facilitate the identification of business services.

Approach

– Application of role modelling (separation of concerns)

– Method to decompose a process based on roles.

Agenda

1. Motivation.

2. Approach: role-based modelling.

3. Example of application.

3artur.caetano@ist.utl.pt

Enterprise Architecture

Enterprise architecture (EA) is a coherent whole

of principles, methods and models used to

analyse, design and realise the infrastructure,

processes and support systems of an

organization.

EA artefacts cross-cut heterogeneous domains

such as strategy, people, processes, services,

information, IS, IT.

Multiple views are required to address the

concerns of all stakeholders (cf. ISO 42010,

ArchiMate, TOGAF).

Enterprise Architecture

artur.caetano@ist.utl.pt 5

Strategy

Business

IS Infrastructure

IT Infrastructure

Strategic Indicators, External Products & Services,

Contracts, Rules, Regulations, …

Software, Services, Components, Packages, …

Business Processes, Information Entities, Actors,

Organizational Units, Operational Indicators, …

Processing, Storage and Communication nodes

and artefacts, …

6-10 yrs

3-6 yrs

< 6 mo

2-5 yrs

Business Process Modelling

Business processes describe how a set of

structured activities produce an output.

Processes can be modelled using different

modelling languages and paradigms.

– Most focus on the specification of the workflow of a

process (transformational paradigm).

BPMLs are often method-independent:

– do not provide the means to assess the qualities of

a model;

– do not prescribe process design principles.

Process Decomposition

artur.caetano@ist.utl.pt 7

A1

A1.2 A1.3A1.1

A1.1.N...

A1.1.2A1.1.1

The specification of an atomic activity is always

context-dependent.

Process Decomposition

artur.caetano@ist.utl.pt 8

View #1

A1.3

A2

A1.1 A1.2

A1.2.2

A2.2A2.1

A1

A1.2.1

Process Decomposition

Lack of criteria to determine when and how to decompose

an activity.

Lack of criteria to determine whether an activity is atomic.

Views over the same business process may be inconsistent.

View #2

B3

B3.2B3.1

B1

B12B1.1

B2

B2.2B2.1

Business Process

?

Agenda

1. Motivation.

2. Approach: role-based modelling.

3. Example of application.

10artur.caetano@ist.utl.pt

Separation of Concerns

Separation of concerns, which, even if not

perfectly possible, is yet the only available

technique for effective ordering of one's

thoughts, that I know of. This is what I mean

by “focussing one's attention upon some

aspect”: it does not mean ignoring the

other aspects, it is just doing justice to the

fact that from this aspect's point of view, the

other is irrelevant.

Edsger Dijkstra, “On the role of scientific thought”, 1982.

Separation of Concerns

SoC is an abstraction technique.

Its main goal is to isolate the different concerns

(aspects) of a system in a given context.

Isolated concerns are easier to analyse and

understand.

SoC approach:

1. Identify the concerns (i.e. build a concern ontology).

2. Analyse the separated concerns.

3. Weave the concerns back together.

Buy Item

Role Modelling as SoC Entities (natural types) specify the structure (active and

passive) of a system.

Role types describe the behaviour of each entity.

Entities play roles in a specific collaboration context.

An activity is a role-based collaboration between entities.

ItemBuyer Seller

Payment

BookstorePerson BookCredit

Card

Role Types and Natural Types

Role type (e.g. Buyer, Seller)

– Founded: existence depends on other concepts

– Not rigid: looses identity outside context

Natural type (e.g. Person, Book)

– Not founded: independent existence

– Rigid: universal (upper-domain) identity

N. Guarino. “Concepts, attributes and their relations”. Data & Knowledge Engineering (8), 249-261, 1992.

Agenda

1. Motivation.

2. Approach: role-based modelling.

3. Example of application.

16artur.caetano@ist.utl.pt

Conference Organization

«Organizing a conference involves managing

paper submissions. Authors submit papers to

the conference. The papers are then reviewed

by at least two reviewers who produce a written

review. The reviewers cannot be the authors of

the paper»

Conference Organization

«Organizing a conference involves managing

paper submissions. Authors submit papers to

the conference. The papers are then reviewed

by at least two reviewers who produce a written

review. The reviewers cannot be the authors of

the paper»

Concerns (role type ontology)

– Actor role (who) Author, Reviewer

– Resource role (what) Paper, Review

Conference Organization

«Organizing a conference involves managing paper

submissions. Authors submit papers to the

conference. The papers are then reviewed by at

least two reviewers who produce a written review.

The reviewers cannot be the authors of the paper»

19artur.caetano@ist.utl.pt

2..*

actor:

Author

actor:

Reviewerresource:

Paperresource:

Review

ManagePaper

Conference Organization

View #1 “Who is doing what?”

View #2 “What resources are being used?”

artur.caetano@ist.utl.pt 20

Role-based Decomposition Example

actor:

Reviewerresource:

Paperresource:

Review actor:

Authorresource:

Paper

ManagePaper

A1 A2

2..*

actor:

Author

actor:

Reviewerresource:

Paperresource:

Review

ManagePaper

Decomposition based on the “actor” role type.

Role-based Decomposition

artur.caetano@ist.utl.pt 22

Example

actor:

Author

actor:

Reviewerresource:

Paper

actor:

Author

actor:

Reviewer

resource:

Review

Decomposition based on the “resource” role type.

ManagePaper

A3

2..*

A4

actor:

Author

actor:

Reviewerresource:

Paperresource:

Review

ManagePaper

Role-based Decomposition

An activity is defined a collaboration between

entities playing roles.

The decomposition method recursively separates

an activity into sub-activities while it contains

overlapping role types.

An activity is considered atomic if it has no

overlapping role types (i.e. cannot be further

decomposed).

artur.caetano@ist.utl.pt 23

Role Type Ontology

A role type ontology specifies the role types (i.e. concerns)

applicable to a given domain.

Upper-level ontologies specify domain-independent

concerns, such as:

– Actor – who

– Resources – what

– Locations – where

– Goals – why

– Events – when

Domain-specific ontologies specify concerns applicable to a

given context. These can be refined from the upper-level

ontology.

Example

Role Type Ontology

artur.caetano@ist.utl.pt 25

Summary

The proposed method decomposes a business process based

on a role type ontology that specifies the concerns of the

stakeholders.

– Enables creating views over a process that focus on

specific concern.

– Enables identifying the atomic activities of a process

based on a set of concerns (role types).

– Facilitates the identification of business services (and thus

business - IS mapping).

This abstraction technique reduces the problem of process

decomposition to the problem of identifying a suitable role

type ontology.

An Application of Role Modelling to the Decomposition of Business Processes

Artur Caetano, José Borbinha, José Tribolet

Dep. of Computer Science and Engineering, IST, Technical University of Lisbon&Information Systems Group, INESC-ID Lisbon

artur.caetano@ist.utl.pt

CONFENIS 2012. September 2012, Ghent, Belgium.