Re: Definition of business process

[Nikola Stojanovic <nstojano@cjds.com>]

Bob Haugen wrote:

> Cory Casanave wrote:
> > It may be better to position ebXML as having a specification (not model)
of
> > the externally visible (e-) business process.
>
> When I first read this, I agreed on the external vs internal aspect,
> but was not sure about the specification vs model aspect.
>
> After reading Christian Huemer's message (excerpted below),
> I am persuaded that models will be valuable. (Imagine that,
> persuaded by somebody's argument on a mailing list...)
>
> >btw, Bob we did not change our name because we want to concentrate
> >on business modelling (if so we would be the business
> >process modelling project team :-) ). rather it is true
> >that we wanted to get rid of 'methodology'. because the
> >decision was made that we not create/select a methodology
> >to produce the artifacts of the business modelling phase.
> >we just want to define a meta-model that is able to
> >capture the artifacts. the question is now: which artifacts
> >would that be?
>
> Thanks, Christian.  I still think it should be the external
> relationships between parties, not the internal workings
> of companies.  But I understand that is a fuzzy boundary.
>

Bob,
I kind of agree with you on spec/model and internal/external. However:

1) Specification and Model could be perceived as the same KindOf categories
and don't need to be mutually exclusive. Also, to produce either of them
you'll need to do some things, call it methodology or ad-hoc discovery,
or... L in XML and UML stands for Language and doesn't say anything about
the Content of what is said. Language doesn't speak on its own.

2) To do a Business using ebXML, everybody (SMEs included) will need to plug
into a ebXML space => someone will need to do that mapping "aBusiness ->
ebXMLSpace" and question for each Party would be how much will be needed to
get there.

3) I hope that Business Process Meta Model will be Reflective
(Introspective, ...) in order to adapt itself. Then the question "which
artifacts would that be" might allow for possibly recursive Meta Models. And
then we might have something like "aBusiness <-> ebXMLSpace".

Nikola