scholarly journals A Workflow Criticality-Based Approach to Bypass the Workflow Satisfiability Problem

2021 ◽  
Vol 2021 ◽  
pp. 1-15
Author(s):  
Monsef Boughrous ◽  
Hanan El Bakkali
Keyword(s):  
Security Policy ◽  
Business Processes ◽  
Workflow Management ◽  
Satisfiability Problem ◽  
Workflow Management Systems ◽  
Security Risks ◽  
New Approach ◽  
Authorized User ◽  
Workflow Execution ◽  
Model Complex

Workflow management systems are very important for any organization to manage and model complex business processes. However, significant work is needed to keep a workflow resilient and secure. Therefore, organizations apply a strict security policy and enforce access control constraints. As a result, the number of available and authorized users for the workflow execution decreases drastically. Thus, in many cases, such a situation leads to a workflow deadlock situation, where there no available authorized user-task assignments for critical tasks to accomplish the workflow execution. In the literature, this problem has gained interest of security researchers in the recent years, and is known as the workflow satisfiability problem (WSP). In this paper, we propose a new approach to bypass the WSP and to ensure workflow resiliency and security. For this purpose, we define workflow criticality, which can be used as a metric during run-time to prevent WSP. We believe that the workflow criticality value will help workflow managers to make decisions and start a mitigation solution in case of a critical workflow. Moreover, we propose a delegation process algorithm (DP) as a mitigation solution that uses workflow instance criticality, delegation, and priority concepts to find authorized and suitable users to perform the critical task with low-security risks.

scholarly journals An Approach To E-Workflow Systems With The Use Of Patterns

2015 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 4-20
Author(s):  
John Ndeta ◽  
Stamatia A. Katriou ◽  
Kerstin V. Siakas
Keyword(s):  
Business Processes ◽  
Workflow Management ◽  
Management Systems ◽  
Practical Application ◽  
Workflow Management Systems ◽  
Activity Diagram ◽  
Workflow Systems ◽  
Workflow Pattern ◽  
Uml Activity Diagram ◽  
Input Format

Abstract In today’s highly competitive and rapidly changing environment, e-businesses constantly have to modify their business processes, i.e. the flow of documents and tasks in a business also known as workflow. More flexible Workflow Management Systems are required to support these constantly changing processes. In this research a platform independent architecture for the design of e-workflow systems is illustrated. The architecture includes an information pool, namely a Workflow Pattern Repository, which contains patterns, which are repeatable solutions to reoccurring problems, in order to make the system more apt to change and assist the workflow designer/user in defining workflows faster and more accurately. The patterns in the repository are in the form of UML activity diagram templates. A straightforward input format for storing patterns in the repository is provided along with an example of its practical application.

A business process modeling‐based approach to investigate complex processes

2012 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
pp. 122-137 ◽  
Author(s):  
Faisal A. Abu Rub ◽  
Ayman A. Issa
Keyword(s):  
Business Process ◽  
Process Modeling ◽  
Business Processes ◽  
Business Process Modeling ◽  
New Techniques ◽  
New Approach ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Complex Processes ◽  
Model Complex

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to develop a new approach to investigate complex processes, such as software development processes, using business process modeling.Design/methodology/approachThe paper presents an investigation into the use of role activity diagramming (RAD) to model complex processes in the software industry sector, with reference to the process of TestWarehouse as a case study.FindingsSystematic extension and quantitative analysis to RAD models led to the discovery of process bottlenecks, identification of cross functional boundary problems, and focused discussion about automation of processes.Research limitations/implicationsFurther work is required to validate and evaluate the proposed approach using several cases with different application domains and thus generalize the adopted approach.Practical implicationsA new approach has been used successfully to understand and analyze business processes. The tools and techniques that are used to perform the approach are not complicated and do not need much specialist expertise, so the approach is not only oriented toward specialists but also toward organizations' managers and staff.Originality/valueNew techniques have been developed by using process modelling to deepen the understanding and analyzing of complex organizational processes. This research implements a practical investigation which uses a case study to validate the new techniques.

Information flow control for workflow management systems

2014 ◽  
Vol 56 (6) ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas Bauereiß ◽  
Dieter Hutter
Keyword(s):  
Flow Control ◽  
Information Flow ◽  
Business Processes ◽  
Open Systems ◽  
Workflow Management ◽  
User Interaction ◽  
Security Requirements ◽  
Management Systems ◽  
Workflow Management Systems ◽  
Information Flow Control

AbstractWorkflow management plays an important role in analyzing and automating business processes. Security requirements in workflow management systems are typically mapped to (role-based) access control configurations. This paper focuses on information flow control, taking into account implicit information leaks. The presented approach operates on a specification level in which no executable program is available yet. We illustrate the modeling of a workflow management system as a composition of state-event systems, each representing one of the activities of the workflow. This facilitates distributed deployment and eases verification by splitting up the verification of the overall system into verification of the individual components. Confidentiality requirements are modeled in terms of information flow predicates using the MAKS framework and verified following existing decomposition methodologies, which are adapted for open systems with ongoing user interaction. We discuss the interaction with other security requirements, notably separation of duty.

Model Checking of Constraint-Based Workflow Based on Linear Temporal Logic

2012 ◽  
Vol 601 ◽  
pp. 401-405
Author(s):  
Wen Bo Zhou ◽  
Shu Zhen Yao
Keyword(s):  
Model Checking ◽  
Temporal Logic ◽  
Business Processes ◽  
Workflow Management ◽  
Linear Temporal Logic ◽  
Management Systems ◽  
Workflow Management Systems ◽  
Model Based ◽  
Büchi Automaton ◽  
Constraint Based Models

The degree of flexibility of workflow management systems heavily influences the way business processes are executed. Constraint-based models are considered to be more flexible than traditional models because of their semantics: everything that does not violate constraints is allowed. More and more people use declarative languages to define workflow, such as linear temporal logic. But how to guarantee the correctness of the model based on the linear temporal logic is still a problem. This article proposes a way to verify the model based on Büchi automaton and gives the corresponding algorithms. Thus the verification of declarative workflow based on the linear temporal logic is solved.

A Fully Distributed Architecture for Large Scale Workflow Enactment

2003 ◽  
Vol 12 (04) ◽  
pp. 411-440 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roberto Silveira Silva Filho ◽  
Jacques Wainer ◽  
Edmundo R. M. Madeira
Keyword(s):  
Large Scale ◽  
Single Point ◽  
Workflow Management ◽  
Management Systems ◽  
Centralized Control ◽  
Dynamic Allocation ◽  
Workflow Management Systems ◽  
Client Server ◽  
Workflow Execution ◽  
Distributed Components

Standard client-server workflow management systems are usually designed as client-server systems. The central server is responsible for the coordination of the workflow execution and, in some cases, may manage the activities database. This centralized control architecture may represent a single point of failure, which compromises the availability of the system. We propose a fully distributed and configurable architecture for workflow management systems. It is based on the idea that the activities of a case (an instance of the process) migrate from host to host, executing the workflow tasks, following a process plan. This core architecture is improved with the addition of other distributed components so that other requirements for Workflow Management Systems, besides scalability, are also addressed. The components of the architecture were tested in different distributed and centralized configurations. The ability to configure the location of components and the use of dynamic allocation of tasks were effective for the implementation of load balancing policies.

A FLEXIBLE FAILURE-RECOVERY MODEL FOR WORKFLOW MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS

2005 ◽  
Vol 14 (01) ◽  
pp. 1-24 ◽  
Author(s):  
GWAN-HWAN HWANG ◽  
YUNG-CHUAN LEE ◽  
BOR-YIH WU
Keyword(s):  
Flow Analysis ◽  
Workflow Management ◽  
Object Oriented ◽  
Failure Recovery ◽  
Management Systems ◽  
Recovery Model ◽  
Workflow Management Systems ◽  
Data Flow Analysis ◽  
Workflow Execution ◽  
Failure Handling

In this paper, we propose a new failure-recovery model for workflow management systems (WfMSs). This model is supported with a new language, called the workflow failure-handling (WfFH) language, which allows the workflow designer to write programs so that he can use data-flow analysis technology to guide the failure recovery in workflow execution. With the WfFH language, the computation of the end compensation point and the compensation set for failure recovery can proceed during the workflow process run-time according to the execution results and status of workflow activities. Also, the failure-recovery definitions programmed with the WfFH language can be independent, thereby dramatically reducing the maintenance overhead of workflow processes. A prototype is built in a Java-based object-oriented workflow management system, called JOO-WfMS. We also report our experiences in constructing this prototype.

scholarly journals A precondition-based approach to workflow oriented software re-engineering

2014 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-27
Author(s):  
Feng Chen ◽  
Da Tang ◽  
Hongji Yang ◽  
Mohammed Alawairdhi
Keyword(s):  
Program Analysis ◽  
Business Processes ◽  
Workflow Management ◽  
Software Systems ◽  
Workflow Model ◽  
Workflow Management Systems ◽  
Software Reengineering ◽  
Analysis Techniques ◽  
Basic Technology ◽  
Process Perspective

Workflow management systems (WfMSs) become the basic technology for organizations to build their Information Systems. To understand the business processes already implemented in the existing software systems and then build the workflow oriented Information System is a time-consuming and error prone process. This paper proposes a unified software reengineering approach from a business process perspective. A workflow extraction method is developed to elicit the business processes from existing systems. A precondition-based workflow model is designed for this purpose, which is an activity-centred method for program analysis. The calculation of the activity?s whole condition provides powerful analysis techniques to verify the correctness of the recovered workflow model. Through the proposed approach, the workflow procedures can be recovered from the existing system and verified by the precondition analysis.

scholarly journals Context-sensitive constraints for access control of business processes

2018 ◽  
Vol 15 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-30
Author(s):  
Gordana Milosavljevic ◽  
Goran Sladic ◽  
Branko Milosavljevic ◽  
Miroslav Zaric ◽  
Stevan Gostojic ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Access Control ◽  
Business Processes ◽  
Workflow Management ◽  
Management Systems ◽  
Sensitive Information ◽  
Workflow Management Systems ◽  
Workflow Systems ◽  
Context Sensitive ◽  
The Common ◽  
Role Based

Workflow management systems (WfMS) are used to automate and facilitate business processes of an enterprise. To simplify the administration, it is a common practice in many WfMS solutions to allocate a role to perform each activity of the process and then assign one or more users to each role. Typically, access control for WfMS is role-based with a support of constraints on users and roles. However, merely using role and constraints concepts can hardly satisfy modern access control requirements of a contemporary enterprise. Permissions should not solely depend on common static and dynamic principles, but they must be influenced by the context in which the access is requested. In this paper, we focus on the definition and enforcement of the context-sensitive constraints for workflow systems. We extended the common role-based constraints listed in literature with context-sensitive information and workflow specific components. Also, we propose a mechanism for enforcing such constraints within WfMS.

A Dynamic Workflow Management Model Based on Web Services

2010 ◽  
Vol 439-440 ◽  
pp. 599-604
Author(s):  
Hong Zhen Xu ◽  
Bin Tang ◽  
Ying Gui ◽  
Huai Ping Wang
Keyword(s):  
Web Services ◽  
Business Processes ◽  
Workflow Management ◽  
Management Model ◽  
Workflow Management Systems ◽  
Workflow Technology ◽  
Adaptive Workflow ◽  
Model Based ◽  
Dynamic Workflow

Workflow technology has emerged as one of those technologies designed to support modeling, designing and executing business processes. One of the major limitations of current workflow management systems is the lack of flexibility to support dynamic management of workflows. In this paper, we propose a dynamic workflow management model based on web services. We integrate web services and ontology technologies to support dynamic specifying, monitoring, analyzing, designing, configuring and executing workflows. We explain the need and functionality of the main modules and interfaces of the model, and introduce its application in a case study. An important feature of this model is to support for planning and adaptive workflow management.

A contract-based workflow execution framework for realizing artifact-centric business processes in a dynamic and collaborative environment

2020 ◽  
Vol 16 (4) ◽  
pp. 427-449
Author(s):  
Kan Ngamakeur ◽  
Sira Yongchareon
Keyword(s):  
Business Processes ◽  
Service Oriented Architecture ◽  
Workflow Management ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Workflow Systems ◽  
Workflow Execution ◽  
Collaborative Environment ◽  
Service Oriented ◽  
Business Entities ◽  
Model Conversion

Purpose The paper aims to study realization requirements for the flexible enactment of artifact-centric business processes in a dynamic, collaborative environment and to develop a workflow execution framework that can effectively address those requirements. Design/methodology/approach This study proposed a framework and contract-based, event-driven architecture design and implementation that can directly realize collaborative artifact-centric business processes in service-oriented architecture (SOA) without any model conversion. Findings The results show that the approach is feasible in presenting several key benefits over the use of existing workflow systems to run artifact-centric processes. Originality/value Most of the existing approaches require an artifact-centric model to be transformed into executable workflow languages to run on existing workflow management systems. This study argues that the model conversion can incur losses of information and affect traceability and monitoring ability of workflows, especially in an SOA where a workflow can span across multiple inter-business entities.

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