Comments on: 12 Different Ways to Model Business Processes

By: Business-Driven SOA – Reference Models and Standards « Active Knowledge Modeling

Wed, 09 Dec 2009 15:39:55 +0000

[...] wrong, business process modeling and information management through semantic data vocabularies. Conventional business process modeling is neither reconfigurable nor event-driven. Processes should be combined with product models and [...]

By: Column 2 : links for 2009-04-23

Column 2 : links for 2009-04-23 — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 17:02:25 +0000

[...] 12 Different Ways to Model Business Processes « Active Knowledge Modeling A brief description of several different process modelling methodologies. (tags: bpa) [...]

By: Overview of 12 Different Approaches to Business Process Modeling « Business Process Management (BPM) - InSights

Wed, 22 Apr 2009 23:26:30 +0000

[...] Practice, Process Modelling, Resources, Workflow. Tags: BPA, BPM, How To, Modeling trackback An informative post describing the various ways to model business processes can be found at Active Knowledge Modeling. [...]

By: Håvard Jørgensen

Håvard Jørgensen — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 20:30:38 +0000

Thank you, Steinar. You pointed out five major types of process modeling languages more than a decade ago, so this presentation owes a lot to you. Regarding BPMN, it can of course also be grouped as a role-oriented language with its pools and lanes, but it seem to lack the interaction/collaboration concepts that are so central in RIN and RAD.

I appreciate your observation. Maybe we should distinguish better within the large group of “transformational” languages, like you suggest. Is there a better name for this group?

There is clearly a difference between models that focus on the processing of data and/or material, and those that focus purely on coordination of the workflow. On the other hand, these two aspects are also often woven together. Most of the languages represent both data flow and control flow. BPMN would, as you say, primarily fit in the second group, but not completely. In BPMN I guess it is the messaging, not the flows, that represent the data flow and input-output-processing. Whether the distinction between flows and messages is more of a strength than a weakness, I’m not sure.

I recently read a paper that tried to capture data flow problems with Petri Nets, which is perhaps the purest “activity sequencing” language out there? Of course, there will never be a clear-cut taxonomy of such complex matters …

By: links for 2009-04-01 « steinarcarlsen

links for 2009-04-01 « steinarcarlsen — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 20:03:23 +0000

[...] 12 Different Ways to Model Business Processes « Active Knowledge Modeling (tags: bpm processmodeling processdiscovery) [...]

By: Steinar Carlsen

Steinar Carlsen — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 19:06:17 +0000

Nice overview, Håvard! I do not necessarily agree that BPMN is transformational in an IPO-sense, since BPMN focuses on the activity flow (sequencing of activities) rather than transforming inputs to outputs; but this also depends on the modelling style chosen. I have often seen newcomers to BPMN starting out with “DFD-style” of modelling; when they get to understand uncontrolled flows etc. they develop a modelling style more concerned with the sequencing of activities than covering all aspects of information flow.