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Process Instance Similarity: Potentials, Metrics, Applications

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Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNPSE,volume 10033))

Abstract

The analysis of process instance similarity offers valuable input for certain application fields including the evaluation of instance clusters, the identification of compliance abuses, and process optimization. In this paper, we discuss the topic of instance similarity in general: We show that similarity might be determined from different process perspectives such as control flow, time, and instance attributes. Each of these perspectives impose individual requirements on the similarity calculation concerning data and structure. Four metrics for process instance similarity are proposed covering different perspectives. The applicability and feasibility of the proposed metrics are evaluated based on a prototypical implementation and real-world process logs from the BPI challenges.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    http://www.xes-standard.org/.

  2. 2.

    If several end nodes are allowed by the respective meta model, the closest one is selected.

  3. 3.

    www.r-project.org.

  4. 4.

    http://www.promtools.org.

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Acknowledgments

This work has been funded by the Vienna Science and Technology Fund (WWTF) through project ICT15-072.

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Correspondence to Johannes Pflug .

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Pflug, J., Rinderle-Ma, S. (2016). Process Instance Similarity: Potentials, Metrics, Applications. In: Debruyne, C., et al. On the Move to Meaningful Internet Systems: OTM 2016 Conferences. OTM 2016. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 10033. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-48472-3_8

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-48472-3_8

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