Research On Workflow Modeling Based On UML Activity Diagrams And XPDL Specifications

With the rapid development of information technology and the unceasingly proposed of new enterprise demand, workflow technology is urgently required by more and more modern enterprises for optimizing and reorganizing their processes under large-scale opening environment, in order to retain their stable and optimized state in either predictable or unpredictable condition. But, at present, the flow management system faces the problems of weak adaptability, bad flexibility, low ability in associating different enterprise platforms and lowly widespread utilization. According to the work flow standards developed by WfMC(Workflow Management Coalition) and the basic concepts and architecture of workflow process model, this paper put forward a new workflow modeling method based on extended UML activity diagram and XPDL specification.Firstly, in order to solve the problems of poor description ability and adaptation existed in present workflow management system. The three layers meta-model of workflow processing that was provided, a new workflow modeling method based on extended UML activity diagrams is put forward. The proposed method extends the traditional activity model and introduces the new modeling elements definition, route configuration and modeling rules, such as multiple instance node, constrain route node and coordinating node. Research results of modeling instance show, the proposed method has significant advantages in enhancing description ability, and improving system flexibility and adaptability.Secondly, the workflow definition language standards are not unified, led to associating different enterprise platform is very difficult. In accordance with XPDL (workflow process definition language) standards, a conversion from UML activity diagram to the XPDL specifications is proposed, it gives a detailed transform process and optimize rules, and the correctness of the conversion process to prove that the mapping from UML activity diagram to XPDL specifications is achieve a good goal.Finally, the analysis of workflow process model is a very important aspect in workflow management system,but it was often ignored due to various reasons. Combining the mathematical theory of Random Petri net and its strong advantage on analyzing the workflow model, this paper gives a simplify quantitative analysis, which provides precise data to reform the workflow model, and finally improve its efficiency and extend its life-cycle.