[werkflow-user] musings

Brian Topping

2004-01-29 07:39:05 UTC

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hi all,


Werkflow project looks operational, but otherwise inactive.  Is there a story there?  Should I avoid it?


I'm looking at a workflow engine to be able to manage a large (several hundred maybe) number of concurrent workflows.  A user needs to be able to log in and have the system give them an activity from an active case based on the roles that they are a part of.  

Question:  Can Werkflow provide a list of all activities that are available across all cases for a given role?  It seems pretty simple, but none of the examples really address anything this complex, and the interfaces aren't all clear yet.

As our system evolves, I'd like to be able to track activity execution times to the database, then use that data to predictively choose which tasks need to be executed first by an available user in a role to minimize the number of business constraints that are violated because of poor scheduling (consider orders that have to be sent for next day delivery).  If this were easy to answer, it would be done already, and I'm not looking for a how-to on this.  But the question of whether the architecture of Werkflow can (or should) handle this is another question.  

I like that Werkflow is very abstract with respect to persistence.  jbpl is really heavily coupled to the database, it will be impossible to use without forking it as the first step.

I also saw the attached list on one of the jbpl forum.  Can someone check off the items that do and do not work?  The seem to have all but about two of them.

(Don't worry about replying if this project is on a ventilator and counting the days... :-)


Thanks a bunch in advance,


-b


BASIC CONTROL FLOW:


1. Sequence

 2. Parallel split 

 3. Synchronization

 4. Exclusive choice

 5. Simple merge


ADVANCED BRANCHING:


6. Multi-choice

 7. Synchronizing merge

 8. Multi-merge

 9. Discriminator


STRUCTURAL:


10. Structured cycle

 11. Arbitrary cycle

 12. Implicit termination

 13. Multiple instances without synchronization

 14. Multiple instances with a priori design time knowledge

 15. Multiple instances with a priori runtime knowledge

 16. Multiple instances without a priori runtime knowledge


STATE BASED:


17. Deferred choice

 18. Interleaved parallel routing

 19. Milestone


CANCELLATION:


20. Cancel activity

 21. Cancel case


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