web based GPD

[nafisehasani]

Hi
Is there any roadmap for developing a web based GPD ?
for exmple openwfe has a web based graphical process designer named droflo and I think it is a really good advantage , imagine that a manager can change the flow of his company in a web based environment !

[kukeltje]

Imagine that the manager knows the process of his company ;-)

Personally I think the advantage of a web based designer is not that big. Droflo is not bad, but the ease with which you develop processes can not be compared to jBPM GPD.

That does not mean a web based GPD is not interesting and that we do not want to have one. It's just not on the roadmap.

[nafisehasani]

Imagine that the manager knows the process of his company and can change it on demand ;-)

I agree with you that working with your GPD is realy easier and smarter than droflo but you know , I think it's worth developing a web based GPD .

37 developers can do that ;-)

[kukeltje]

Ok... my turn

Imagine that the manager knows the process of his company and can change it on demand and totaly screws it up;-)

And as a matter of fact I am not joking. We have at the company I work for have a tool to only draw the internal processes and manually at the values of kpi's. It's often screwed up because someone just changes it without detailed knowledge

btwe, you are right, 37 developers can do that if e.g.:
- it is on the priority list (file a jira issue and get others to vote)
- no other work needs to be done (fat change :-) )
- someone (me?) gets payed to do it :-)
- ....

[nafisehasani]

my turn now !
Imagine that the manager knows the process of his company and can change it on demand and totaly screws it up unless she/he was educated for working with your tool ;-)

actually in a company you can have an expert for working with such tools (we can educate one of them to work with GPD so she/he will be an expert on GPD ! ) and nothing got screwed .

BTW:
-I know this feature is not in priority list
-there is no need fo fat changes because a web based GPD is realy an indepndent module form the jbpm.
-if someone (you ! ) want to do it how much mony does it cost for me ?

[aguizar]

Hilarious!

BTW, I don't think Ronald is talking of expertise with the tools, but the underlying organizational procedure.

[nafisehasani]

ok , I said that if a person understand the concepts of process management and also know the tool , it is rarely happens that she/he screwed the organizational processes and I think it is not Hilarious ;-)
so let me know what is the meaning of on demand business ?

[ralfoeldi]

Never, ever tell the business side something is easy or can be done in an hour. Everything MUST take at least 5 days.

Then, and only then, does the business side think through the consequences of any change requests and if they still want it, well... maybe they can get it a bit cheaper.

I'm (only) half joking. Anything done on an impulse will lead to chaos and nobody is going to convince me that changes to business processes(hello!? oragnisational changes!) have to be done online. (We're talking direct changes to a production system here, not changes with proper deployment cycles - staging, testing, production, right?)

The problem is that the moment the business side knows something is possible you hardly stand a chance of preventing them from using it.

But if something goes wrong, anything, no matter what. Who's fault is it? ...ours. From the point of view of an end user that is ok. An IT System doesn't work as expected so of course the IT guys are to blame.

Just my 5 cents.

Greetings

Rainer

P.S.: Thats the way it should be. In reality I always - sooner or later - make the mistake and let out the secrets...
P.P.S.: To any potential future employer: this is of course only parody :-)

[nafisehasani]

after all , I think if you prepare what the business really want you will be the winner ! if a task can be done in a day why it should be done in 5 days ?

[nafisehasani]

the main question is that whats your idea about developing a web based GPD ?

[gwittwer]

"nafisehasani" wrote:
Hi
Is there any roadmap for developing a web based GPD ?
for exmple openwfe has a web based graphical process designer named droflo and I think it is a really good advantage , imagine that a manager can change the flow of his company in a web based environment !

Hello

We did something like this in our diploma thesis. The designer-tool (if this is realy a tool ;-) is MS Visio. The Stencil used is EPC (ARIS Template, like state-events).

Workflow:
1. Process designer creates processes in Visio and send them to admin (if this is another person).
2. Admin works with client tool, sends the visio process to a webservice and gets (near-to) jPDL 3.0 XML back. He can optimize and extend the process (assignments, varibales ...) in the client. After this, he creates the PAR and deploy this (over web) into the webapplication.

Advantage:
- Designer Tool is MS Visio and not self-made (you can define your own template, e.g. for BPEL or something else and configure the settings of the transformation-workflow for new "language").
- Deployment over Web
- Client Tool is written in .Net (best for "only-windows-used-application")
- processimage is generated automatically in background (based on visio drawing)
- process designer is supported to add / modify / delete variables/swimlanes/assignments ...

See the demo: http://aibp.dyndns.org:8080/aibp
(If you like a user account then please contact me over the AIBP contact informations).

For further information please contact me over the email published in the AIBP contact menu.

General Workflow:

[img]
http://aibp.dyndns.org:8080/aibp/images/aibp-overview-web.jpg
[/img]

The whitepaper of our solution is published on:
http://aibp.dyndns.org:8080/aibp/documents/AIBP_Whitepaper.pdf
(sorry, only german ;-)

Regards
Gerhard

[aguizar]

Gerhard,

Your work sounds really cool! It has a slight disadvantage, tough: it is Visio-based, not web-based :-(

Anyway, I'm particularly interested in the "define your own template" part. What'd be needed to create a BPEL editor?

[kukeltje]

Alex,

What'd be needed to create a BPEL editor?

http://www.eclipse.org/bpel/ but I'm sure you already knew this one. Can I now get a large bottle of XX? Nice mexican beer, then I send you a champagne sized bottle of Heineken

[koen.aers]

Hey this is great. It has been announced for almost half a year now, but it is the first time I actually see something... Finally I can begin to integrate it... ;-)

Cheers,
Koen

[gwittwer]

Hello Alex

Gerhard,

Your work sounds really cool! It has a slight disadvantage, tough: it is Visio-based, not web-based :-(

Visio is not webbased, that's true and this could be a disadvantage. It was a requirement of our customer to use Visio. But you know, it's also nice to work with Visio, because you can add different templates (stencil-templates) to design processes and you don't have to change your own designer for new templates (e.g: changing the GPD for BPEL support). This is the meaning of "define your own template".
And for BPEL there are different designer existing (I don't know if they are free to use?). Why not focus on the Business Intelligence - the management of the processes in the workflow-engine? That was one important thing in our thesis. Why should we develop a own designer if there are 1000 on the market yet? It's better to speed-up, optimize, extend and maintain the basic - our AIBP software or your jBPM Workflow-Engine Core.

Extension for BPEL in AIBP
What do we (AIBP Projectteam) have to do if we like to work with BPEL instead of ARIS EPC? We define our processes in Visio with the BPEL or the own stencil template. After this, we have to extend the configuration file on the AIBP Webservice with the new Shape ID's (GUID) to know, if its a swimlane, organisation, function... Optionally we can extend the AIBP Client with new functions for BPEL and deploy the process at the end to jBPM. It's clear, there couldn't be all BPEL elements used for jBPM. But the jBPM WE is growing and perhaps this will be possible soon.

There will be a new thesis next year where the extension of AIBP with BPEL will be implemented.

One question: What is your incentive to develop a webbased process designer?

Regards
Gerhard