Investigating business processes

• US 20030236677A1
• Filed: 06/21/2002
• Published: 12/25/2003
• Est. Priority Date: 06/21/2002
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Micro Focus LLC (Open Text Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. (HP Inc.)
• Inventors: Sayal, Mehmet, Casati, Fabio, Shan, Ming-Chien
• Granted Patent: US 7,610,211 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/7.27
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/0633 Workflow analysis
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/0639 Performance analysis of employees; Performance analysis of enterprise or organisation operations
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/067 Enterprise or organisation modelling
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/10 Office automation; Time management

Abstract

Systems and methods of investigating business processes are described. These systems and methods support real-time monitoring, analysis, management, and optimization of business processes. A graphical user interface enables users to apply data warehousing and data mining techniques to business process execution data and to visualize process execution data along multiple configurable dimensions and at different configurable levels of granularity.

Claims

1. A method of investigating a business process, comprising:

accessing process execution data generated by one or more components of a business process platform during execution of one or more instantiations of one or more business processes each involving a set of one or more activities each defined by a respective service and performed by a respective set of one or more resources; and

visualizing the process execution data with a focus on a user-selected process entity and summarized in terms of a user-selected statistic presented across a user-selected perspective corresponding to an attribute dimension of the user-selected process entity.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein visualizing the process execution data comprises generating a database query based upon the user-selected process entity, the user-selected statistic, and the user-selected perspective.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein visualizing the process execution data comprises mapping process execution data in accordance with the user-selected process entity, the user-selected statistic, and the user-selected perspective.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the user-selected process entity is selected from one of:

an aggregation of multiple businesses processes;

a single business process;

a business process service; and

a business process resource.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the user-selected perspective is selected from one of the following process entity attribute dimensions:

time;

a business process service;

a business process resource;

a business process initiator;

a business process node.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the user-selected perspective is user-definable.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein a perspective definition comprises a taxonomy comprising a set of one or more category labels each associated with a respective condition on the process execution data.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein a condition corresponds to one of:

number of activations of a node;

assignment of a node to an identified resource;

duration of a node;

duration of an identified business process;

a value of data items at process instantiation time, completion time, or after execution of a node.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the user-selected statistic is selected from one of:

a count;

running time; and

a standard deviation of running time.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein the user-selected statistic is user-definable.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein a statistic definition comprises a concept label and an identified business process attribute.

12. The method of claim 1, wherein visualizing the process execution data comprises filtering process execution data based upon a set of user-selected restrictions.

13. The method of claim 12, wherein the restrictions are selected from one or more of:

a business process service;

a business process initiator;

a business process resource;

a business process node; and

a time period.

14. The method of claim 1, further comprising monitoring an execution of a business process instance.

15. The method of claim 14, wherein monitoring comprises detecting occurrence of an alert condition.

16. The method of claim 15, wherein the alert condition is user-definable.

17. The method of claim 15, further comprising generating a notification in response to a detected alert condition occurrence.

18. A computer program for investigating a business process, the computer program residing on a computer-readable medium and comprising computer-readable instructions for causing a computer to:

access process execution data generated by one or more components of a business process platform during execution of one or more instantiations of one or more business processes each involving a set of one or more activities each defined by a respective service and performed by a respective set of one or more resources; and

visualize the process execution data with a focus on a user-selected process entity and summarized in terms of a user-selected statistic presented across a user-selected perspective corresponding to an attribute dimension of the user-selected process entity.

19. A system for investigating a business process, comprising a graphical user interface configured to:

prompt a user to select a process entity, a statistic, and a perspective corresponding to an attribute dimension of the user-selected process entity;

based upon the user-selected process entity, statistic and perspective, query process execution data generated by one or more components of a business process platform during execution of one or more instantiations of one or more business processes each involving a set of one or more activities each defined by a respective service and performed by a respective set of one or more resources; and

visualize the queried process execution data with a focus on the user-selected process entity and summarized in terms of the user-selected statistic presented across the user-selected perspective.

20. The system of claim 19, wherein the graphical user interface is configured to prompt a user to select a process entity from:

an aggregation of multiple businesses processes;

a single business process;

a business process service; and

a business process resource.

21. The system of claim 19, wherein the graphical user interface is configured to prompt a user to select a perspective from one of the following process entity attribute dimensions:

time;

a business process service;

a business process resource;

a business process initiator;

a business process node.

22. The system of claim 19, wherein the graphical user interface is configured to prompt a user to define a perspective.

23. The system of claim 22, wherein a perspective definition comprises a taxonomy comprising a set of one or more category labels each associated with a respective condition on the process execution data.

24. The system of claim 23, wherein a condition corresponds to one of:

number of activations of a node;

assignment of a node to an identified resource;

duration of a node;

duration of an identified business process;

a value of data items at process instantiation time, completion time, or after execution of a node.

25. The system of claim 19, wherein the graphical user interface is configured to prompt a user to select a statistic from:

a count;

running time; and

a standard deviation of running time.

26. The system of claim 19, wherein the graphical user interface is configured to prompt a user to define a statistic.

27. The system of claim 26, wherein a statistic definition comprises a concept label and an identified business process attribute.

28. The system of claim 19, wherein the graphical user interface is configured to prompt a user to select a set of restrictions for filtering process execution data to be visualized.

29. The system of claim 28, wherein the graphical user interface is configured to prompt a user to select one or more restrictions from:

a business process service;

a business process initiator;

a business process resource;

a business process node; and

a time period.

30. The system of claim 19, further comprising a monitoring engine operable to monitor execution of a business process instance.

31. The system of claim 30, wherein the monitoring engine is operable to detect occurrence of an alert condition.

32. The system of claim 31, wherein the alert condition is user-definable.

33. The system of claim 31, wherein the monitoring engine is operable to generate a notification to be sent to a user in response to a detected alert condition occurrence.

34. The system of claim 31, wherein the monitoring engine is operable to notify an event to one or more workflow management systems in response to a detected alert condition occurrence.