Process Materialization Using Templates and Rules to Design Flexible Process Models

The main idea in this paper is to show how flexible processes can be designed by combining generic process templates and business rules. At run time we first instantiate a process by applying rules to specific case data and using a materialization algorithm. The customized process instance is then executed in an existing workflow engine. We present an architecture and also give an algorithm for process materialization. The rules are written in a logic-based language like Prolog. Our focus is on capturing deeper process knowledge and achieving a holistic approach to robust process design that encompasses control flow, resources and data, as well as makes it easier to accommodate changes to business policy.