Process engine interoperability: An experiment

Abstract

Now applications are built from a collection of existing offthe-shelf (large) tools which interoperate with each other. Each one of the components may embody its own data and process management, often in an ad hoc way. The work presented here investigates a way to make different built-in process fragments, and general process engines (1) communicate and synchronize with each other; (2) behave in a consistent way; (3) appear to modelers and users as a single process support tool. We have addressed those issues about interoperability in developing an heterogeneous process engine built atop two commercially available tools: Process Weaver and Adele. The main objective was to build an Abstract Process Engine out of the two basic tools, which, without implying any change in their kernels, makes both the two interoperate in a peer-to-peer fashion and with respect to the three requirements stated above. The paper describes the major difficulties encountered in our experience doing this work, how they were overcome, as well as the lessons learned. Finally and in order to put this work in a broader context, an analysis of the current state of the art in the domain of Process Engine Interoperability will conclude the paper.