Abstract
Abstract
Workflow nets, a particular class of Petri nets, have become one of the standard ways to model and analyze workflows. Typically, they are used as an abstraction of the workflow that is used to check the so-called soundness property. This property guarantees the absence of livelocks, deadlocks, and other anomalies that can be detected without domain knowledge. Several authors have proposed alternative notions of soundness and have suggested to use more expressive languages, e.g., models with cancellations or priorities. This paper provides an overview of the different notions of soundness and investigates these in the presence of different extensions of workflow nets. We will show that the eight soundness notions described in the literature are decidable for workflow nets. However, most extensions will make all of these notions undecidable. These new results show the theoretical limits of workflow verification. Moreover, we discuss some of the analysis approaches described in the literature.
- Aal97 Verification of workflow netsApplication and theory of Petri nets 1997. Lecture notes in computer science, vol 12481997BerlinSpringer-Verlag407426Google Scholar
- Aal98 The application of Petri nets to workflow managementJ Circ Syst Comput199881216610.1142/S0218126698000043Google ScholarCross Ref
- Aal00 Workflow verification: finding control-flow errors using Petri-net-based techniquesBusiness process management: models, techniques, and empirical studies. Lecture notes in computer science, vol 18062000BerlinSpringer-Verlag161183Google Scholar
- AH04 Workflow management: models, methods, and systems2004CambridgeMIT pressGoogle ScholarDigital Library
- AH05 YAWL: yet another workflow languageInf Syst200530424527510.1016/j.is.2004.02.002Google ScholarDigital Library
- AHH+08 van der Aalst WMP, van Hee KM, ter Hofstede AHM, Sidorova N, Verbeek HMW, Voorhoeve M, Wynn MT (2008) Soundness of workflow nets: classification, decidability, and analysis. Computer Science report no. 08-13. Technische Universiteit Eindhoven, The NetherlandsGoogle Scholar
- AHH+09 Soundness of workflow nets with reset arcsTransactions on Petri nets and other models of Concurrency III. Lecture notes in computer science, vol 58002009BerlinSpringer-Verlag507010.1007/978-3-642-04856-2_3Google ScholarDigital Library
- AHKB03 Workflow patternsDistrib Parallel Databases200314155110.1023/A:1022883727209Google ScholarDigital Library
- AHV02 van der Aalst WMP, Hirnschall A, Verbeek HMW (2002) An alternative way to analyze workflow graphs. In: Banks-Pidduck A, Mylopoulos J, Woo CC, Ozsu MT (eds) Proceedings of the 14th international conference on advanced information systems engineering (CAiSE’02). Lecture notes in computer science, vol 2348. Springer-Verlag, Berlin, pp 535–552Google Scholar
- ALM+08 van der Aalst WMP, Lohmann N, Massuthe P, Stahl C, Wolf K (2008) From public views to private views: correctness-by-design for services. In: Dumas M, Heckel H (eds) Proceedings of the 4th international workshop on Web services and formal methods (WS-FM 2007). Lecture notes in computer science, vol 4937. Springer-Verlag, Berlin, pp 139–153Google Scholar
- AMSW09 Service interaction: patterns, formalization, and analysisFormal methods for Web services. Lecture notes in computer science, vol 55692009BerlinSpringer-Verlag428810.1007/978-3-642-01918-0_2Google ScholarDigital Library
- BB00 A formal approach to workflow analysisInf Syst Res2000111173610.1287/isre.11.1.17.11787Google ScholarDigital Library
- Ber87 Transformations and decompositions of netsAdvances in Petri nets 1986. Part I: Petri nets, central models and their properties. Lecture notes in computer science, vol 2541987BerlinSpringer-Verlag360376Google Scholar
- BK02 Research commentary: workflow management issues in e-businessInf Syst Res200213111410.1287/isre.13.1.1.94Google ScholarDigital Library
- BP98 Barkaoui K, Petrucci L (1998) Structural analysis of workflow nets with shared resources. In: van der Aalst WMP, De Michelis G, Ellis CA (eds) Proceedings of workflow management: net-based concepts, models, techniques and tools (WFM’98), vol 98/7 of Computing science reports, Lisbon, Portugal. Eindhoven University of Technology, Eindhoven, pp 82–95Google Scholar
- BZ04 Applying propositional logic to workflow verificationInf Technol Manag200453–429331810.1023/B:ITEM.0000031583.16306.0fGoogle ScholarDigital Library
- CW99 Testing undecidability of the reachability in Petri nets with the help of 10th Hilbert problemApplication and theory of Petri nets. Lecture notes in computer science, vol 16391999BerlinSpringer-Verlag268281Google Scholar
- DA04 Bridging the gap between business models and workflow specificationsInt J Coop Inf Syst200413328933210.1142/S0218843004000973Google ScholarCross Ref
- DAC99 Dwyer MB, Avrunin GS, Corbett JC (1999) Patterns in property specifications for finite-state verification. In: ICSE ’99: proceedings of the 21st international conference on software engineering, Los Alamitos, CA, USA. IEEE Computer Society Press, pp 411–420Google Scholar
- DAH05 Process-aware information systems: bridging people and software through process technology2005New JerseyWiley, Hoboken10.1002/0471741442Google ScholarDigital Library
- DAV05 van Dongen BF, van der Aalst WMP, Verbeek HMW (2005) Verification of EPCs: using reduction rules and Petri nets. In: Pastor O, Falcão e Cunha J (eds) Proceedings of the 17th conference on advanced information systems engineering (CAiSE’05). Lecture notes in computer science, vol 3520. Springer-Verlag, Berlin, pp 372–386Google Scholar
- DE95 Desel J, Esparza J (1995) Free choice Petri nets. In: Cambridge tracts in theoretical computer science, vol 40. Cambridge University Press, CambridgeGoogle Scholar
- DFS98 Dufourd C, Finkel A, Schnoebelen Ph (1998) Reset nets between decidability and undecidability. In: Larsen K, Skyum S, Winskel G (eds) Proceedings of the 25th international colloquium on automata, languages and programming. Lecture notes in computer science, vol 1443. Springer-Verlag, Berlin, pp 103–115Google Scholar
- DJS99 Boundedness of reset P/T netsLectures on concurrency and Petri nets Lecture notes. in computer science, vol 16441999BerlinSpringer-Verlag301310Google Scholar
- DR01 Dehnert J, Rittgen P (2001) Relaxed soundness of business processes. In: Dittrich KR, Geppert A, Norrie MC (eds) Proceedings of the 13th international conference on advanced information systems engineering (CAiSE’01). Lecture notes in computer science, vol 2068. Springer-Verlag, Berlin, pp 157–170Google Scholar
- EN94 Decidability issues for Petri nets: a surveyJ Inf Process Cybern1994301431600838.68082Google Scholar
- Esp98a Decidability and complexity of Petri net problems: an introductionLectures on Petri nets I: basic models. Lecture notes in computer science, vol 14911998BerlinSpringer-Verlag374428Google Scholar
- Esp98b Reachability in live and safe free-choice Petri nets is NP-completeTheor Comput Sci19981981–221122410.1016/S0304-3975(97)00235-10902.681361616957Google ScholarDigital Library
- FBS02 Formal verification of e-Services and workflowsWeb services, E-business, and the semantic web, CAiSE 2002 international workshop (WES 2002). Lecture notes in computer science, vol 25122002BerlinSpringer-Verlag188202Google Scholar
- FBS04 Fu X, Bultan T, Su J (2004) Analysis of interacting BPEL Web services. In: International World Wide Web conference: proceedings of the 13th international conference on World Wide Web, New York. ACM Press, pp 621–630Google Scholar
- FFJ+09 Instantaneous soundness checking of industrial business process modelsBusiness process management (BPM 2009). Lecture notes in computer science, vol 57012009BerlinSpringer-Verlag278293Google Scholar
- FS01 Well-structured transition systems everywhere!Theor Comput Sci20012561–2639210.1016/S0304-3975(00)00102-X0973.681701821455Google ScholarDigital Library
- GHS95 An overview of workflow management: from process modeling to workflow automation infrastructureDistrib Parallel Databases19953211915310.1007/BF01277643Google ScholarDigital Library
- GW96 Branching time and abstraction in bisimulation semanticsJ ACM199643355560010.1145/233551.2335560882.680851408565Google ScholarDigital Library
- HSS05 Transforming BPEL to Petri netsInternational conference on business process management (BPM 2005). Lecture notes in computer science, vol 36492005BerlinSpringer-Verlag220235Google Scholar
- HSSV05 Soundness of resource-constrained workflow netsApplications and theory of Petri nets 2005. Lecture notes in computer science, vol 35362005BerlinSpringer-Verlag25026710.1007/11494744_15Google ScholarDigital Library
- HSV03 Soundness and separability of workflow nets in the stepwise refinement approachApplication and theory of Petri nets 2003. Lecture notes in computer science, vol 26792003BerlinSpringer-Verlag335354Google Scholar
- HSV04 Generalised soundness of workflow nets is decidableApplication and theory of Petri nets 2004. Lecture notes in computer science, vol 30992004BerlinSpringer-Verlag19721510.1007/978-3-540-27793-4_12Google Scholar
- JB96 Workflow management: modeling concepts, architecture, and implementation1996LondonInternational Thomson Computer PressGoogle Scholar
- Jen97 Coloured Petri nets. Basic concepts, analysis methods and practical use, vol 1. EATCS monographs on theoretical computer science1997BerlinSpringer-VerlagGoogle Scholar
- JKJ10 Instance deadlock: a mystery behind frozen programsApplications and theory of Petri nets 2010. Lecture notes in computer science, vol 61282010BerlinSpringer-Verlag117Google Scholar
- KA99 Liveness, fairness, and recurrenceInf Process Lett199970626927410.1016/S0020-0190(99)00074-50953.68575Google ScholarDigital Library
- KGMW00 Karamanolis C, Giannakopoulou D, Magee J, Wheater SM (2000) Model checking of workflow schemas. In: Proceedings of the fourth international enterprise distributed object computing conference (EDOC’00), Los Alamitos, CA, USA, 2000. IEEE Computer Society, pp 170–181Google Scholar
- Kin06 On the semantics of EPCs: a framework for resolving the vicious circleData Knowl Eng2006561234010.1016/j.datak.2005.02.005Google ScholarDigital Library
- KMR00 Inter-operability of workflow applications: local criteria for global soundnessBusiness process management: models, techniques, and empirical studies. Lecture notes in computer science, vol 18062000BerlinSpringer-Verlag235253Google Scholar
- KNS92 Keller G, Nüttgens M, Scheer AW (1992) Semantische Processmodellierung auf der Grundlage Ereignisgesteuerter Processketten (EPK). Veröffentlichungen des Instituts für Wirtschaftsinformatik, Heft 89 (in German), University of Saarland, SaarbrückenGoogle Scholar
- LMSW06 Analyzing interacting BPEL processesInternational conference on business process management (BPM 2006). Lecture notes in computer science, vol 41022006BerlinSpringer-Verlag1732Google Scholar
- LR99 Production workflow: concepts and techniques1999New JerseyPrentice-Hall PTR, Upper Saddle RiverGoogle ScholarDigital Library
- LW10 Wendy: a tool to synthesize partners for servicesApplications and theory of Petri nets 2010. Lecture notes in computer science, vol 61282010BerlinSpringer-Verlag279307Google Scholar
- LZLC02 Lin H, Zhao Z, Li H, Chen Z (2002) A novel graph reduction algorithm to identify structural conflicts. In: Proceedings of the thirty-fourth annual Hawaii international conference on system science (HICSS-35). IEEE Computer Society PressGoogle Scholar
- Mar03 On Compatibility of Web servicesPetri Net Newsl2003651220Google Scholar
- Mar05a Martens A (2005) Analyzing Web service based business processes. In: Cerioli M (ed) Proceedings of the 8th international conference on fundamental approaches to software engineering (FASE 2005). Lecture notes in computer science, vol 3442. Springer-Verlag, Berlin, pp 19–33Google Scholar
- Mar05b Martens A (2005) Consistency between executable and abstract processes. In: Proceedings of international IEEE conference on e-Technology, e-Commerce, and e-Services (EEE’05). IEEE Computer Society Press, pp 60–67Google Scholar
- MMN+06 Faulty EPCs in the SAP reference modelInternational conference on business process management (BPM 2006). Lecture notes in computer science, vol 41022006BerlinSpringer-Verlag451457Google Scholar
- MNA07 Mendling J, Neumann G, van der Aalst WMP (2007) Understanding the occurrence of errors in process models based on metrics. In: Curbera F, Leymann F, Weske M (eds) Proceedings of the OTM conference on cooperative information systems (CoopIS 2007). Lecture notes in computer science, vol 4803. Springer-Verlag, Berlin, pp 113–130Google Scholar
- MRS05a Massuthe P, Reisig W, Schmidt K (2005) An operating guideline approach to the SOA. In: Proceedings of the 2nd South-East European workshop on formal methods 2005 (SEEFM05), Ohrid, Republic of MacedoniaGoogle Scholar
- MRS05b An operating guideline approach to the SOAAnn Math Comput Teleinformatics2005133543Google Scholar
- Mue04 Workflow-based process controlling: foundation, design and application of workflow-driven process information systems2004BerlinLogosGoogle Scholar
- Mur89 Petri nets: properties, analysis and applicationsProc IEEE198977454158010.1109/5.24143Google ScholarCross Ref
- MVD+08 Detection and prediction of errors in EPCs of the SAP reference modelData Knowl Eng200864131232910.1016/j.datak.2007.06.019Google ScholarDigital Library
- ODA+09 From business process models to process-oriented software systemsACM Trans Softw Eng Methodol200919113710.1145/1555392.1555395Google ScholarDigital Library
- PW06a Puhlmann F, Weske M (2006) Interaction soundness for service orchestrations. In: Dan A, Lamersdorf W (eds) Proceedings of service-oriented computing (ICSOC 2006). Lecture notes in computer science, vol 4294. Springer-Verlag, Berlin, pp 302–313Google Scholar
- PW06b Investigations on soundness regarding lazy activitiesInternational conference on business process management (BPM 2006). Lecture notes in computer science, vol 41022006BerlinSpringer-Verlag145160Google Scholar
- PW09 A look around the corner: the pi-calculusTransactions on Petri nets and other models of concurrency II. Lecture notes in computer science, vol 54602009BerlinSpringer-Verlag647810.1007/978-3-642-00899-3_4Google ScholarDigital Library
- RA08 Conformance checking of processes based on monitoring real behaviorInf Syst2008331649510.1016/j.is.2007.07.001Google ScholarDigital Library
- SO97 Sadiq W, Orlowska ME (1997) On correctness issues in conceptual modeling of workflows. In: Proceedings of the 5th European conference on information systems (ECIS ’97), Cork, Ireland, pp 19–21Google Scholar
- SO00 Analyzing process models using graph reduction techniquesInf Syst200025211713410.1016/S0306-4379(00)00012-0Google ScholarDigital Library
- SW01 Petri net-based modelling of workflow systems: an overviewEur J Oper Res2001134366467610.1016/S0377-2217(00)00292-70984.90005Google ScholarCross Ref
- TAS09 Data-flow anti-patterns: discovering data-flow errors in workflowsAdvanced information systems engineering, proceedings of the 21st international conference on advanced information systems engineering (CAiSE’09). Lecture notes in computer science, vol 55652009BerlinSpringer-Verlag425439Google Scholar
- Too04 van der Toorn R (2004) Component-based software design with Petri nets: an approach based on inheritance of behavior. PhD thesis, Eindhoven University of Technology, Eindhoven, The NetherlandsGoogle Scholar
- VA05 Verbeek HMW, van der Aalst WMP (2005) Analyzing BPEL processes using Petri nets. In: Marinescu D (ed) Proceedings of the second international workshop on applications of Petri nets to coordination, workflow and business process management. Florida International University, Miami, Florida, pp 59–78Google Scholar
- VAH07 Verifying workflows with cancellation regions and OR-joins: an approach based on relaxed soundness and invariantsComput J200750329431410.1093/comjnl/bxl074Google ScholarCross Ref
- VBA01 Diagnosing workflow processes using WoflanComput J200144424627910.1093/comjnl/44.4.2460993.68141Google ScholarCross Ref
- VVL07 Vanhatalo J, Völzer H, Leymann F (2007) Faster and more focused control-flow analysis for business process models through SESE decomposition. In: Krämer B, Lin K, Narasimhan P (eds) Proceedings of service-oriented computing (ICSOC 2007). Lecture notes in computer science, vol 4749. Springer-Verlag, Berlin, pp 43–55Google Scholar
- VWAH10 Reduction rules for reset/inhibitor netsJ Comput Syst Sci201076212514310.1016/j.jcss.2009.06.0031187.68330Google ScholarDigital Library
- WAHE06 Verifying workflows with cancellation regions and OR-joins: an approach based on reset nets and reachability analysisInternational conference on business process management (BPM 2006). Lecture notes in computer science, vol 41022006BerlinSpringer-Verlag389394Google Scholar
- WEAH05 Achieving a general, formal and decidable approach to the OR-join in workflow using reset netsApplications and theory of Petri nets 2005. Lecture notes in computer science, vol 35362005BerlinSpringer-Verlag42344310.1007/11494744_24Google ScholarDigital Library
- Wes07 Business process management: concepts, languages, architectures2007BerlinSpringer-VerlagGoogle ScholarDigital Library
- WG07 A process-algebraic approach to workflow specification and refinementSoftware composition. Lecture notes in computer science, vol 48292007BerlinSpringer-Verlag5165Google Scholar
- WG08 A process semantics for BPMNInternational conference on formal engineering methods (ICFEM 2008). Lecture notes in computer science, vol 52562008BerlinSpringer-Verlag2731Google Scholar
- WG09 Wong PYH, Gibbons J (2009) Property specifications for workflow modelling. In: Proceedings of 7th international conference on integrated formal methods. Lecture notes in computer science, vol 5423. Springer-Verlag, BerlinGoogle Scholar
- Whi09 White SA et al (2009) Business process modeling notation specification (Version 1.2, OMG Final Adopted Specification)Google Scholar
- Wol09 Does my service have partners?Transactions on Petri nets and other models of concurrency II. Lecture notes in computer science, vol 54602009BerlinSpringer-Verlag15217110.1007/978-3-642-00899-3_9Google ScholarDigital Library
- Wom06 Wombacher A (2006) Decentralized consistency checking in cross-organizational workflows. In: Proceedings of international conference on e-Technology, e-Commerce and e-Service (CEC/EEE 2006). IEEE Computer Society, pp 39–46Google Scholar
- WVA+09 Soundness-preserving reduction rules for reset workflow netsInf Sci2009179676979010.1016/j.ins.2008.10.0331162.68488Google ScholarDigital Library
Index Terms
- Soundness of workflow nets: classification, decidability, and analysis
Recommendations
Soundness of Workflow Nets with Reset Arcs
Transactions on Petri Nets and Other Models of Concurrency IIIPetri nets are often used to model and analyze workflows. Many workflow languages have been mapped onto Petri nets in order to provide formal semantics or to verify correctness properties. Typically, the so-called Workflow nets are used to model and ...
An analytical method for well-formed workflow/Petri net verification of classical soundness
Abstract In this paper we consider workflow nets as dynamical systems governed by ordinary difference equations described by a particular class of Petri nets. Workflow nets are a formal model of business processes. Well-formed business processes ...
Complexity of the Soundness Problem of Workflow Nets
Application and Theory of Petri Nets and Concurrency, 2012Classical workflow nets WF-nets for short are an important subclass of Petri nets that are widely used to model and analyze workflow systems. Soundness is a crucial property of workflow systems and guarantees that these systems are deadlock-free and ...
Comments