What is the role BPM(BussinessProcessManagement) in a realtime application ? I mean in which cases or where actaully the BPM is used ? I could get the documentation from the net , but where actaully it is used ?
A:
One definition of BPM is that is combines workflow management (humans interacting) with enterprise application integration (EAI, systems interacting). You can get applications and tools for those applications - sometime embedded - which you can use to define you business process. Then, in a staging process, you can roll out the business process to that system or a set of applications. To execute a business process (BP) you can use a business process engine (e.g. jBPM), and each step of a business process can be represented by a user interaction, a user task, a system task or variations of these. You can have parallel business steps that only once all of these complete can go to the next business process step. And there is much more to that.
Once you have rolled out a business process you can monitor it and collect data for a number of parameters. Often you will be interested how long a business process took and what the limiting factors are, e.g. how many manual steps are required. Then you can go back to the designer tool and modify the process. With data taken from the production system you can then simulate whether your changes are actually an improvement. And if they are you roll it out replacing the previous version.
On a smaller scale you can workflow designer or business process designers to allow user changing a particular part of a process. Often applications have hard-coded business process support with only limited parameterization/configuration. Take an approval process. Which purchases need approval? By whom? Could multiple people approve in parallel thus shortening the purchasing process? You application may offer your users to design the approval process as needed. It would no longer be hard-coded and allow for much better adaptation to the needs of your customer.
These are just a few thought and definitely not a full coverage of this subject. But maybe it already gives some idea.
John
2010-08-16 07:30:43