A Hybrid Approach Based on Reuse Techniques for Autonomic Adaptation of Business Processes

Abstract

Complexity of highly dynamic environments in which processes operate makes their adaptation difficult to perform. However, adaptation of an in-progress process is an essential requirement for any Business Process Management System (BPMS). So, several contributions have recommended the use of the MAPE-K (Monitor, Analyze, Plan, Execute - Knowledge) control loop from the autonomic computing as a solution to tackle this issue, thus bringing BPMS with self-adaptation capabilities. However, in these contributions, a comprehensive overview of the generic process self-adaptation has been missing. Moreover, faced with the high cost and the difficulty of self-adapting processes, the idea of capitalizing on previous adaptation solutions by implementing reuse techniques is appealing. In this paper, we recommend a hybrid approach to adapt running processes using versions, previous adaptation cases and rules as reuse techniques. Our solution is implemented as an adaptation engine that instantiates the MAPE-K control loop and that can be connected to any BPMN-based BPMS using appropriate adapters. Our adaptation engine is therefore reusable. Finally, we demonstrate the advantages and feasibility of the recommended approach with an example from the crisis domain.