Business Process Management with JBoss jBPM: A Practical Guide for Business Analysts

217 Pages·2007·5.44 MB·English

by  Matt Cumberlidge

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Business Process Management
with JBoss jBPM
A Practical Guide for Business Analysts
Develop business process models for implementation in
a business process management system
Matt Cumberlidge
BIRMINGHAM - MUMBAI
Business Process Management with JBoss jBPM
A Practical Guide for Business Analysts
Copyright © 2007 Packt Publishing
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval
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Every effort has been made in the preparation of this book to ensure the accuracy of
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However, Packt Publishing cannot guarantee the accuracy of this information.
First published: July 2007
Production Reference: 1190707
Published by Packt Publishing Ltd.
32 Lincoln Road
Olton
Birmingham, B27 6PA, UK.
ISBN 978-1-847192-36-3
www.packtpub.com
Cover Image by Vinayak Chittar ([email protected])
Credits
Author Editorial Manager
Matt Cumberlidge Dipali Chittar
Reviewers Project Coordinator
Diego Naya Lazo Sagara Naik
Dr. David Franklin
Sebastien Michea Indexer
Bhushan Pangaonkar
Senior Acquisition Editor
David Barnes Proofreader
Chris Smith
Development Editor
Nikhil Bangera Production Coordinator
Manjiri Nadkarni
Technical Editor
Ajay S Cover Designer
Shantanu Zagade
Project Manager
Abhijeet Deobhakta
About the Author
Matt Cumberlidge is a business analyst working for a world leading FTSE 100
provider of information-driven services and solutions based in Oxford, UK. In this
role, Matt has undertaken a very wide range of projects, but the common theme
running throughout is that of business process. Over the last year or so Matt has
extended his core capabilities in business process analysis and re-engineering into
the realm of business process management and in particular an investigation of the
JBoss jBPM implementation. Matt is delighted to be able to share his experiences and
ideas about this exciting technology with a wider audience through the publication
of this book.
I'd like to thank my wife, Cathy, for understanding why I wasn't
always available to do my share of the housework while I was
writing this book and for feeding the cats, who would otherwise
surely have died of hunger. I'd like to thank Phil Wilkins from
SeeWhy for going way beyond the call of duty in helping me. I'd
like to thank my publishers, Packt, and in particular Dave Barnes for
his encouragement. Lastly, I'd like to thank and pay tribute to the
contributors to the JBoss jBPM community who have built a fantastic
product that it was fun for me to write about.
About the Reviewers
Diego Naya Lazo is a Chief Enterprise Architect living in Buenos Aires, Argentina.
He currently works for Argentina's biggest healthcare provider and has more than 10
years of experience in the IT industry. He participated in several projects as a hands-
on software architect and performed the technical lead role in many companies. His
interest in computer programming began with his desire to create the most vivid 3D
animations as a graphic designer at the age of 15.
Dr David Franklin is an experienced hands-on software architect with more than
20 years experience with leading-edge companies and technologies.
Sebastien Michea is a J2EE software architect at Manaty (www.manaty.net).
After a PhD in Mathematical Physics at Université de Bourgogne (Dijon, France),
he studied Quantum Statistical systems in Yonsei university (Seoul). Programming
with Java since its first version, he joined Cap Gemini Telecom in Paris as a Java
developer. He then worked at PSU (State College, USA) as a Lecturer and Researcher
in the Computer Science and Mathematics department and simultaneously
developed a trading system based on non-linear correlations.
In 2006 he founded Manaty, an open-source IT company which is closer to a
freelancer community than a traditional company that create software using cutting-
edge technologies like EJB3, Flex, and.NET.
His main areas of interest are software design, science, linguistic, and cooking.

Table of contents
Preface 1
Chapter 1: Introduction 5
The BPM approach to software development 6
Evolution of software development methodologies 6
The emergence of key technologies 9
Meanwhile—management theory 10
What is a business process and why do we want to manage it? 10
Business process improvement and re-engineering 11
From this convergence, BPM emerges 11
Business process management: a definition 12
Key benefits of BPM 12
Typical business scenarios ripe for BPM 14
How this book works 14
The solution we'll build 15
Introducing our suggested project lifecycle 15
Introducing our example business scenario 16
Introducing our example BPM suite 16
JBoss jBPM 17
JBoss 18
SeeWhy business intelligence platform 19
Summary 20
Chapter 2: Understanding the target process 21
Setting up the project 22
Introducing our example business scenario 23
Project initiation document 24
Scope the target process 25
Table of contents
Put together the project team 29
Identify project sponsors 30
Project office 30
Identify process owners and subject matter experts 31
Kick-off meeting 34
Analyze the process 34
Map the workflow 35
Example 36
Identify roles and responsibilities 38
Activity flow diagram 38
RACI matrix 42
Put metrics alongside the process 44
Example 45
Identify quick wins 48
Example 49
Sign off to be process 52
Summary 52
Chapter 3: Develop the process in JBoss jBPM 53
Introduction 53
The JBoss jBPM architecture 54
Installation 54
Install Java 55
Install the JBoss jBPM engine and the JBoss application server 57
Install the JBoss jBPM designer 59
Set up shortcuts 66
Touring the designer's user interface 66
Package explorer 66
Editor area 67
Properties explorer 72
Outline view 72
JBoss jBPM concepts 73
jBPM process definition language—jPDL 73
Nodes 74
Transitions 76
Actions 76
Swimlanes 76
Process variables 77
Process state 77
Super state 77
Building our example process 77
Add our swimlanes 80
Adding our nodes 81
Export for sign-off 95
Summary 98
[ ii ]
Table of contents
Chapter 4: The prototype user interface 99
Build the prototype 99
Develop the prototype user interface 100
Set up our users 106
Deploy the process and user interface 114
Investigating the web console interface 116
End users 119
Managers 122
Adapt the web console 124
Sign off for the proof of concept 125
Summary 126
Chapter 5: Iterate the prototype 127
Set up for the proof of concept 127
Set up the team 127
Set expectations 128
Plan the proof-of-concept program 129
Capture requirements 129
Make jBPM available on a server 130
Run the proof of concept 132
Iterate the system 132
Process changes 132
Task prioritization 133
Integration with other systems 134
Obtain sign-off 140
Summary 141
Chapter 6: Proof-of-concept to implementation 143
Preparation for implementation 144
Judging readiness 144
Implementation plan 144
Customizing the web console 146
Swapping the database back end 149
Install the database server 149
Install the database tables 150
Import the data 154
Set up a JNDI data source 155
Install the MySQL driver 155
Amend the JBoss configuration 155
Amend the hibernate configuration 157
Monitoring the process 158
Process management 159
Process metrics analysis 159
Process forecasting 160
[ iii ]