Workflow and Process Management

It has been quite an interesting year for those monitoring the activities of the Workflow Management Coalition (WfMC). This past year saw the release of Version 1.1 of the Wf-XML interoperability binding, an XML-based standard facilitating consistent data transfer between workflow engines, after substantial collaborative testing and discussion. The WfMC and Business Process Management Initi ative (BPMI is a non-profit corporation which aims to promote and develop the use of business process management), met in London to discuss the possibility of a joint initiative. Later in the year, Version 1.0 of the Workflow Process Definition Interface (XPDL) was released. It comprises a specification supporting process definition import and export, a common meta-model for describing the process definition and an XML schema specifying the XML Process Definition Language (XPDL). (XPDL samples are available to view or download from the WfMC website.) More recently, there has been a great deal of discussion on the existing interfaces for workflow client and invoked applications and possible improvements to the specification. But what does all this mean to the user and business community? In previous releases of the WfMC Workflow Handbook, Rob Allen and Charles Plesums have provided excellent introductory and detailed information on the many facets of workflow and workflow management. This paper seeks instead to look at the impact of current workflow trends and the practical benefits of WfMC efforts.