PROCESS FLOW ANALYSIS BASED ON PROCESSING ARTIFACTS

• US 20080282236A1
• Filed: 05/09/2007
• Published: 11/13/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 05/09/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Accenture Global Services Limited (Accenture PLC)
• Original Assignee: Accenture Global Services Limited (Accenture PLC)
• Inventors: Neft, Mark
• Granted Patent: US 8,504,995 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 717/155
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/28 by checking the correct order of processing G06F11/08 - G06F11/26 take precedence; monitoring patterns of pulse trains H03K5/19
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/3466 Performance evaluation by tracing or monitoring
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2201/86 Event-based monitoring
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2201/865 Monitoring of software
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/45516 Runtime code conversion or optimisation

Abstract

A plurality of reporting elements are applied to a process, which reporting elements, during operation of the process, generate processing artifacts each including a coordination identification (relative to a specific item flowing through the process), a service identification and a time stamp. Thereafter, flow of the item through the process may be analyzed based on the processing artifacts. The processing artifacts may be stored locally at each reporting element or centrally. In the presently preferred embodiment, the analysis of the flow of an item through the process includes generating an industry-standard representation of the flow based on the processing artifacts. In this manner, the present invention provides for a complete analysis of a given process, particularly business processes, through the collection of relatively simple, easily-generated processing artifacts.

Claims

1. A method for analyzing flow of an item through a process, the method comprising:

applying a plurality of reporting elements to the process;

during operation of the process, generating, by each activated reporting element of the plurality of reporting elements, processing artifacts each comprising a coordination identification that is substantially unique to the item, a service identification that is substantially unique to a portion of the process to which the reporting element is applied, and a time stamp; and

analyzing flow of the item through the process based on the processing artifacts.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein at least a portion of the process is implemented via software instructions, and wherein applying the plurality of reporting elements to the process further comprises modifying at least a portion of the software instructions.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein modifying the portion of the software instructions further comprises modifying source code of the portion of the software instructions.

4. The method of claim 2, wherein modifying the portion of the software instructions further comprises modifying object code of the portion of the software instructions.

5. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

storing, by each activated reporting element, at least a portion of the processing artifacts to provide stored processing artifacts.

6. The method of claim 5, further comprising centrally storing the at least the portion of the processing artifacts to provide centrally stored processing artifacts,

wherein analyzing the flow of the items through the process is based on the centrally stored processing artifacts.

7. The method of claim 5, further comprising locally storing at least a portion of the processing artifacts to provide locally stored processing artifacts,

wherein analyzing the flow of the items through the process is based on the locally stored processing artifacts.

8. The method of claim 5, further comprising:

collecting the locally stored processing artifacts to provide logged processing artifacts,

wherein analyzing the flow of the item through the process is based on the logged processing artifacts.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein applying the plurality of reporting elements to the process further comprises applying at least one reporting element of the plurality of reporting elements either prior to, after or prior to and after an entry point of at least one sub-process of the process.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein applying the plurality of reporting elements to the process further comprises applying at least one reporting element of the plurality of reporting elements either prior to, after or prior to and after an exit point of at least one sub-process of the process.

11. The method of claim 1, wherein analyzing the flow of the item further comprises generating a representation of the flow of the item through the process based at least in part upon the processing artifacts.

12. The method of claim 11, wherein generating the representation of the flow further comprises transforming the processing artifacts.

13. The method of claim 11, wherein generating the representation of the flow further comprises generating an industry-standard representation.

14. A method for analyzing of flow of an item through a process, the method comprising:

acquiring processing artifacts generated by at least one of a plurality of reporting elements applied to the process each comprising a coordination identification that is substantially unique to the item, a service identification that is substantially unique to a portion of the process to which a corresponding one of the plurality of reporting elements is applied, and a time stamp; and

analyzing flow of the item through the process based at least in part upon the processing artifacts.

15. The method of claim 14, wherein acquiring the processing artifacts further comprises accessing stored processing artifacts, and wherein analyzing the flow of the item through the process is based on the stored processing artifacts.

16. The method of claim 14, wherein analyzing the flow of the item further comprises generating a representation of the flow of the item through the process based at least in part upon the processing artifacts.

17. The method of claim 16, wherein generating the representation of the flow further comprises transforming the processing artifacts.

18. The method of claim 16, wherein generating the representation of the flow further comprises generating an industry-standard representation.

19. The method of claim 16, further comprising:

rendering the representation of the flow in a visual format.

20. An apparatus for analyzing flow of an item through a process, comprising:

a processing artifact collector operative to acquire, from at least one of a plurality of reporting elements, processing artifacts each comprising a coordination identification that is substantially unique to the item, a service identification that is substantially unique to a portion of the process to which a corresponding one of the plurality of reporting elements is applied, and a time stamp; and

a flow analyzer, in communication with the processing artifact collector, operative to receive the processing artifacts and analyze flow of the item through the process based at least in part upon the processing artifacts.

21. The apparatus of claim 20, the flow analyzer further comprising:

a representation generation component, in communication with the flow analyzer, operative to generate a representation of the flow of the item through the process based at least in part upon the processing artifacts.

22. The apparatus of claim 21 further comprising:

an output component, in communication with the representation generation component, operative to provide a visual depiction of the representation.

23. The apparatus of claim 20, further comprising:

at least one storage device, in communication with the flow analyzer, operative to store the processing artifacts.

24. The apparatus of claim 23, wherein the processing artifact collector is in communication with the at least one storage device.

25. An apparatus for analyzing flow of an item through a process, comprising:

at least one processor;

a storage device, in communication with the at least one processor, having stored thereon executable instructions that, when executed, cause the processor to;

acquire processing artifacts, generated by at least one of a plurality of reporting elements applied to the process, each comprising a coordination identification that is substantially unique to the item, a service identification that is substantially unique to a portion of the process to which a corresponding one of the plurality of reporting elements is applied, and a time stamp; and

analyze flow of the item through the process based at least in part upon the processing artifacts.

26. The apparatus of claim 25, wherein the executable instructions that, when executed, cause the at least one processor to acquire the processing artifacts further comprise executable instructions that, when executed, cause the at least one processor to access stored processing artifacts.

27. The apparatus of claim 26, wherein the executable instructions that, when executed, cause the at least one processor to acquire the processing artifacts further comprise executable instructions that, when executed, cause the at least one processor to collect locally stored processing artifacts from the at least one of the plurality of reporting elements.

28. The apparatus of claim 25, wherein the executable instructions that, when executed, cause the at least one processor to acquire the processing artifacts further comprise executable instructions that, when executed, cause the at least one processor to collect centrally stored processing artifacts from the at least one of the plurality of reporting elements.

29. The apparatus of claim 25, wherein the executable instructions that, when executed, cause the at least one processor to analyze the flow of the item further comprise executable instructions that, when executed, cause the at least one processor to generate a representation of the flow of the item through the process based at least in part upon the processing artifacts.

30. The apparatus of claim 25, wherein the storage device further comprises executable instructions that, when executed, cause the at least one processor to:

render the representation of the flow in a visual format.

31. In a reporting element for use in analyzing flow of an item through a process, a method for providing processing artifacts, the method comprising:

detecting an event related to the item flowing through the process;

providing, in response to the event, a coordination identification that is substantially unique to the item;

providing, in response to the event, a service identification that is substantially unique to a portion of the process to which the reporting element is applied; and

providing, in response to the event, a time stamp,

wherein the coordination identification, the service identification and the time stamp collectively constitute a processing artifact.

32. The method of claim 31, further comprising:

providing the processing artifact to an analyzer.

33. The method of claim 32, wherein providing the processing artifact to the analyzer further comprises storing the processing artifact in a local storage.

34. The method of claim 32, wherein providing the processing artifact to the analyzer further comprises storing the processing artifact in a central storage.

35. A reporting element for generating processing artifacts during operation of a process, comprising:

an event detector operative to detect an event related to an item flowing through the process;

a coordination identification provider, in communication with the event detector, operative to generate a coordination identification, in response to the event, that is substantially unique to the item;

a service identifier provider, in communication with the event detector, operative to determine a service identification, in response to the event, that is substantially unique to a portion of the process to which the reporting element is applied; and

a time stamper, in communication with the event detector, operative to determine a time stamp in response to the event.

36. A machine-readable medium having stored thereon executable instructions for implementing the reporting element of claim 35.

37. A machine-readable medium having stored thereon at least one data structure for use in analyzing flow of an item through a process, each of the at least one data structure comprising:

a coordination identification, provided by a reporting element, that is substantially unique to the item;

a service identification that is substantially unique to a portion of the process to which the reporting element is applied; and

a time stamp corresponding to occurrence of an event within the process related to the item.