Catálogo de publicaciones - libros

Optimized and implemented processes go live after their final acceptance sign-off. This means that they are executed in the course of ongoing business operations, in the organization and IT environment described in the previous chapters. Experience reveals that process execution here is exposed over time to changes to a variety of influencing factors. These can negatively affect the process performance and thus increasingly decrease value generation, if not addressed properly. An example of such factors is the rapid, nonpredicted increase in parallel occurring instances of customer inquiries in a bidding process. This can lead to an increase in turnaround time for quotations, with the risk that potential customers switch to competitors.

This chapter presents a precise formulation of the S-BPM constructs discussed in the preceding chapters. We express them in the form of an abstract SBD-interpreter, which yields a precise, controllable definition of the subject behavior in SBDs, the so-called semantics of SBDs. Furthermore, this definition establishes a solid scientific foundation for the S-BPM method to support a guarantee of the implementation correctness of the interpreter by the Metasonic modeling tool.

In the following sections, we provide insights into jBOOK, jSIM, and the Metasonic Suite, exemplifying a set of tools for each activity bundle in the development process for business process applications. jBOOK is a documentation tool to support subject-oriented analysis. jSIM can be used by Actors to simulate processes based on subject-oriented models on the computer.

This book provides comprehensive insights into the subject-oriented methodology. In addition to deriving and justifying the concept, we have developed a subject-oriented process model for dealing with models. To complete the picture with respect to BPM, we examine the extent to which other methods also comprise subject-oriented elements. The focus on subjects while reflecting standard sentence semantics of natural language can be spotted in the canon of existing approaches for modeling business processes in various places. The following overview of essential diagrammatic or formal modeling methods for business processes shows the different links of existing approaches to the modeling categories subject, predicate, and object. The respective approaches are comparatively described.

As shown in the previous chapters, continuous sociotechnical system development is based on models. In case of appropriate support through modeling and implementation technology, stakeholders (i.e., all actors involved in business operations) may adjust the implementation of business process models according to their individual needs without additional development costs. This can be achieved if process descriptions are directly executable, and so enable a seamless alignment between modeling and execution.