Schema Evolution publication categorizer

In this paper, we discuss the problem of performing impact prediction for changes that occur in the schema/structure of the data warehouse sources. We abstract Extract-Transform-Load (ETL) activities as queries and sequences of views. ETL activities and its sources are uniformly modeled as a graph that is annotated with policies for the management of evolution events. Given a change at an element of the graph, our method detects the parts of the graph that are affected by this change and highlights the way they are tuned to respond to it.

In this paper, we deal with the problem of performing what-if analysis for changes that occur in the schema/structure of the data warehouse sources. We abstract software modules, queries, reports and views as (sequences of) queries in SQL enriched with functions. Queries and relations are uniformly modeled as a graph that is annotated with policies for the management of evolution events. Given a change at an element of the graph, our method detects the parts of the graph that are affected by this change and indicates the way they are tuned to respond to it.

Workflow technology has emerged as an appropriate platform for consolidating the distributed information resources of an enterprise, promoting interoperability across cross-platform systems and for providing a global view and understanding of business process models. However, the business processes that workflows represent, are dynamic by nature, that is, they encounter frequent and unavoidable changes. It is through this dynamism that organizations maintain their competitive edge. Workflow technology to date does not provide sufficient support for dynamically changing processes.

Dynamic evolution of workflow models due to process (re)engineering activities and dynamic changing situations of the real process is one of the most important challenges in workflow management. In this paper, we present an approach for the management of evolving workflow specifications which copes with the evolution of a workflow schema and the dynamic modification of workflow instances.

Dynamic change is a large and pervasive unsolved problem which surfaces within office systems as well as within software engineering, manufacturing, and numerous other domains. Procedural changes, performed in an ad hoc manner, can cause inefficiencies, inconsistencies, and catastrophic breakdowns within offices. This paper is concerned with dynamic change to procedures in the context of workflow systems. How can we make workflow systems more flexible and open?

Continuously arising new trends in information technology and developments at the (e–business)
market let companies crave for automated business process support. Process management systems offer
the promising possibility to (electronically) define, control, and monitor business processes. However, if
this technology shall be applicable in practice it must be possible to change running business processes
even at runtime. Basically, such process changes can take place at two levels – the process type level

Inheritance is one of the key issues of object-orientation. The inheritance mechanism allows for the definition of a subclass which inherits the features of a specific superclass. When adapting a workflow process definition to specific needs (ad-hoc change) or changing the structure of the workflow process as a result of reengineering efforts (evolutionary change), inheritance concepts are useful to check whether the new workflow process inherits some desirable properties of the old workflow process.

Sollen Workflow-Management-Systeme (WfMS) in umfassender Weise fur die rechnerbasierte Verwaltung und Steuerung von Geschftsprozessen einsetzbar sein, mssen die von ihnen verwalteten Workflow-Schemata und -Instanzen bei Bedarf rasch anpassbar sein. Dabei mssen die auf Basis eines (alten) Workflow-Schemas erzeugten Instanzen auch nach dessen nderung ungestrt weiterlaufen knnen, etwa durch Bereitstellung geeigneter Versionskonzepte.

An important yet open problem in workflow management is the evolution of workflow schemas, i.e., the creation, deletion and modification of workflow types in such a way that the schema remains correct. This problem is aggravated when instances of modified workflow types are active at the time of modification, because any workflow instance has to conform to the definition of its type.This paper presents a framework for dynamic workflow schema evolution that is based on workflow type versioning and workflow migration.

A basic step towards flexibility in workflow systems is the consistent and effective management of workflow evolution, i.e., of changing existing workflows while they are operational. In this area, the most challenging issue is the handling of running instances when their schema is modified: simple solutions can be devised, but these often imply loosing all the work done or failing in capturing the advantages offered by workflow modifications; this is unacceptable for many applications. In this paper we address the problem of workflow evolution, from both a static and a dynamic point of view.