Skip to main content

TCTV: Trace Clustering Considering Intra- and Inter-cluster Similarity Based on Trace Variants

  • Conference paper
  • First Online:
Service-Oriented Computing (ICSOC 2023)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNCS,volume 14420))

Included in the following conference series:

  • 312 Accesses

Abstract

As we know that simply applying existing techniques in process mining will often yield a highly incomprehensible process model that called the spaghetti-like model, because real-life processes are typically less structured and more complex than expected by stakeholders. In order to address this issue, trace clustering is considered one of the most relevant pre-processing approaches as grouping similar event logs can radically reduce the complexity of the discovered models. Trace variants denote unique control-flow complete trajectories of a process model. The comparison of trace variants opens the door for a fine-grained analysis of the distinctive features inherent in the execution of a process. In this paper, we propose a split-merge clustering method based on trace variants for pre-processing event logs. Our method consists of three phases: (1) trace variants are filtered out from the event log, and the k-nearest neighbor graph is constructed based on all trace variants; (2) the graph would be partitioned into the initial sub-clusters by applying the coarsening and partitioning operations; (3) we dynamically merge two sub-clusters in the hierarchical clustering process with the relative inter-connectivity and the relative closeness. The experiments on real-life event logs confirmed the improvements of our method compared with the baselines.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 49.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 64.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Notes

  1. 1.

    https://anonymous.4open.science/r/TCTV.

  2. 2.

    https://data.4tu.nl/collections/789491a1-2b09-4ed6-af75-8a5aadada5ac.

  3. 3.

    https://data.4tu.nl/articles/dataset/BPI_Challenge_2017/12696884.

  4. 4.

    https://data.4tu.nl/collections/BPI_Challenge_2020/5065541.

References

  1. van der Aalst, W.: Process Mining: Discovery, Conformance and Enhancement of Business Processes. Springer, Heidelberg (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-662-49851-4

    Book  MATH  Google Scholar 

  2. Appice, A., Malerba, D.: A co-training strategy for multiple view clustering in process mining. IEEE Trans. Serv. Comput. 9(6), 832–845 (2015)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  3. Berti, A., van der Aalst, W.M.: Reviving token-based replay: increasing speed while improving diagnostics. In: Algorithms and Theories for the Analysis of Event Data, vol. 2371, pp. 87–103 (2019)

    Google Scholar 

  4. Boltenhagen, M., Carmona, J., Chatain, T.: Model-based trace variant analysis of event logs. Inf. Syst. 102, 101675 (2020)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  5. Cadez, I., Heckerman, D., Meek, C., Smyth, P., White, S.: Model-based clustering and visualization of navigation patterns on a web site. Data Min. Knowl. Disc. 7, 399–424 (2003)

    Article  MathSciNet  Google Scholar 

  6. Ceravolo, P., Damiani, E., Torabi, M., Barbon, S.: Toward a new generation of log pre-processing methods for process mining. In: Carmona, J., Engels, G., Kumar, A. (eds.) BPM 2017. LNBIP, vol. 297, pp. 55–70. Springer, Cham (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-65015-9_4

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  7. Chatain, T., Carmona, J., van Dongen, B.: Alignment-based trace clustering. In: Mayr, H.C., Guizzardi, G., Ma, H., Pastor, O. (eds.) ER 2017. LNCS, vol. 10650, pp. 295–308. Springer, Cham (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-69904-2_24

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  8. De Koninck, P., De Weerdt, J.: Scalable mixed-paradigm trace clustering using super-instances. In: International Conference on Process Mining, pp. 17–24 (2019)

    Google Scholar 

  9. De Weerdt, J., vanden Broucke, S., Vanthienen, J., Baesens, B.: Active trace clustering for improved process discovery. IEEE Trans. Knowl. Data Eng. 25(12), 2708–2720 (2013)

    Google Scholar 

  10. Delias, P., Doumpos, M., Grigoroudis, E., Matsatsinis, N.: A non-compensatory approach for trace clustering. Int. Trans. Oper. Res. 26(5), 1828–1846 (2017)

    Article  MathSciNet  MATH  Google Scholar 

  11. Ferreira, D., Zacarias, M., Malheiros, M., Ferreira, P.: Approaching process mining with sequence clustering: experiments and findings. In: Alonso, G., Dadam, P., Rosemann, M. (eds.) BPM 2007. LNCS, vol. 4714, pp. 360–374. Springer, Heidelberg (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-75183-0_26

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  12. Greco, G., Guzzo, A., Pontieri, L., Saccà, D.: Mining expressive process models by clustering workflow traces. In: Dai, H., Srikant, R., Zhang, C. (eds.) PAKDD 2004. LNCS (LNAI), vol. 3056, pp. 52–62. Springer, Heidelberg (2004). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-24775-3_8

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  13. Greco, G., Guzzo, A., Pontieri, L., Saccà, D.: Discovering expressive process models by clustering log traces. IEEE Trans. Knowl. Data Eng. 18, 1010–1027 (2006)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  14. Karypis, G., Han, E.H., Kumar, V.: Chameleon a hierarchical clustering algorithm using dynamic modeling. Computer 32, 68–75 (1999)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  15. Karypis, G., Kumar, V., Comput, S.: A fast and high quality multilevel scheme for partitioning irregular graphs. SIAM J. Sci. Comput. 20(1), 359–392 (1998)

    Article  MathSciNet  MATH  Google Scholar 

  16. Lee, D., Park, J., Pulshashi, I.R., Bae, H.: Clustering and operation analysis for assembly blocks using process mining in shipbuilding industry. In: Song, M., Wynn, M.T., Liu, J. (eds.) AP-BPM 2013. LNBIP, vol. 159, pp. 67–80. Springer, Cham (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-02922-1_5

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  17. Lin, L., Wen, L., Lin, L., Pei, J., Yang, H.: LCDD: detecting business process drifts based on local completeness. IEEE Trans. Serv. Comput. 15(4), 2086–2099 (2022)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  18. Lu, X., Tabatabaei, S.A., Hoogendoorn, M., Reijers, H.A.: Trace clustering on very large event data in healthcare using frequent sequence patterns. In: Hildebrandt, T., van Dongen, B.F., Röglinger, M., Mendling, J. (eds.) BPM 2019. LNCS, vol. 11675, pp. 198–215. Springer, Cham (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-26619-6_14

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  19. Muñoz-Gama, J., Carmona, J.: A fresh look at precision in process conformance. In: Hull, R., Mendling, J., Tai, S. (eds.) BPM 2010. LNCS, vol. 6336, pp. 211–226. Springer, Heidelberg (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-15618-2_16

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  20. Rafiei, M., Wangelik, F., Aalst, W.: TraVaS: differentially private trace variant selection for process mining. In: Montali, M., Senderovich, A., Weidlich, M. (eds.) ICPM 2022. LNBIP, vol. 468, pp. 114–126. Springer, Cham (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-27815-0_9

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  21. Rousseeuw, P.: Silhouettes: a graphical aid to the interpretation and validation of cluster analysis. Comput. Appl. Math. 20, 53–65 (1987)

    Article  MATH  Google Scholar 

  22. Bose, R.P.J.C., van der Aalst, W.M.P.: Trace clustering based on conserved patterns: towards achieving better process models. In: Rinderle-Ma, S., Sadiq, S., Leymann, F. (eds.) BPM 2009. LNBIP, vol. 43, pp. 170–181. Springer, Heidelberg (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-12186-9_16

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  23. Sun, Y., Bauer, B.: A novel top-down approach for clustering traces. In: Zdravkovic, J., Kirikova, M., Johannesson, P. (eds.) CAiSE 2015. LNCS, vol. 9097, pp. 331–345. Springer, Cham (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-19069-3_21

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  24. Taymouri, F., La Rosa, M., Carmona, J.: Business process variant analysis based on mutual fingerprints of event logs. In: Dustdar, S., Yu, E., Salinesi, C., Rieu, D., Pant, V. (eds.) CAiSE 2020. LNCS, vol. 12127, pp. 299–318. Springer, Cham (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-49435-3_19

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  25. Urschel, J.C., Zikatanov, L.T.: Spectral bisection of graphs and connectedness. Linear Algebra Appl. 449, 1–16 (2014)

    Article  MathSciNet  MATH  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgements

The work was supported by the general project numbered KM202310028003 of Beijing Municipal Education Commission, the National Natural Science Foundation of China (61872252), the National Natural Science Foundation of China under Grant 62362067, Yunnan Xing Dian Talents Support Plan.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Wenlong Chen .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2023 The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG

About this paper

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this paper

Lin, L., Di, Y., Chen, W., Cao, Y., Zhu, R., Zhang, Y. (2023). TCTV: Trace Clustering Considering Intra- and Inter-cluster Similarity Based on Trace Variants. In: Monti, F., Rinderle-Ma, S., Ruiz Cortés, A., Zheng, Z., Mecella, M. (eds) Service-Oriented Computing. ICSOC 2023. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 14420. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-48424-7_6

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-48424-7_6

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-031-48423-0

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-031-48424-7

  • eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics