A state-based context-aware declarative process model

Abstract

Declarative process models support process flexibility, which has been widely recognized as important, particularly for organizations that face frequent changes and variable stimuli from their environment. However, current declarative approaches emphasize activities and provide constraints addressing their existence and dependencies. This expressiveness is not capable of addressing the process context (namely, environment effects) and its goal. The paper proposes a declarative model which addresses activities as well as states, external events, and goals. As such, it explicitly addresses the context of a process. The model is based on the Generic Process Model (GPM), extended by a notion of activity, which includes a state change aspect and an intentional aspect. The achievement of the intention of an activity may depend on events in the environment and is hence not certain. The paper provides a formalization of the model and some conditions for verification. These are illustrated by an example from the medical domain. © 2011 Springer-Verlag.