David Flaxer

Flexible Composition of Enterprise Web Services

The process-based composition of Web services is emerging as a promising approach to automate business process within and across organizational boundaries. In this approach, individual Web services are federated into composite Web services whose business logic is expressed as a process model. Business process automation technology such as workflow management systems (WFMSs) can be used to choreograph the component services. However, one of the fundamental assumptions of most WFMSs is that workflow schemas are static and predefined. Such an assumption is impractical for business processes that have an explosive number of options, or dynamic business processes that must be generated and altered on the fly to meet rapid changing business conditions. In this paper, we describe a rule inference framework called DY flow , where end users declaratively define their business objectives or goals and the system dynamically composes Web services

RuleBAM: a rule-based framework for business activity management

This paper describes a rule-based framework for business activity management called RuleBAM. It is a novel framework whose objective is to support the requirements of dynamic monitoring and control of business applications using policies and rules. RuleBAM is composed of a customized assemblage of built-time and run-time technologies that include business rules and application modeling tools, code generators, transformation services, rules engines, business integration adaptors and Web services. Business activity management (BAM) polices are used to define the requirements of RuleBAM systems and business rules are exploited as execution platform for BAM policies. Taken as a whole, these form a new method of using business rules to enable business activity management. A case study is also presented in this paper.

Realizing business components, business operations and business services

Business components are founded on the notion that complex business organizations can be decomposed into discrete into self-functioning logical units. Decomposing an enterprise into business components facilitates a logical understanding of business design and can be leveraged to provide finer levels of detailed analysis on how it operates. This involves a range of improvements, from evaluating and validating business organization structures, extending to ways of expressing dynamic relationships among business components, and finally, influencing the IT application base and infrastructure that realize the business intent

Using component business modeling to facilitate business enterprise architecture and business services at the US Department of Defense

Component business modeling (CBM) is an aggregation of models, methods and techniques that are designed to organize, understand, evaluate, and ultimately, transform an enterprise. The decomposition of an enterprise into well bounded and discrete business components enables a straightforward understanding of a complex enterprise and facilitates the realization of business intent by information technology. This paper examines the use of CBM within the government sector. At more than twice the size of the worlds largest commercial enterprise, the Business Management Modernization Program (BMMP) of the Department of Defense (DoD) is undertaking a dramatic and complex business transformation. Our team proposed the use of CBM to address their objectives. We first discuss how business components (referred to as business capabilities by the DoD) is used to leverage the enterprise architecture, to analyze business transformation opportunities, and to identify business services. We then describe how the results of CBM can be used to refine a service oriented view of the business

Concepts for Service-Oriented Business Thinking

As businesses scramble to adopt and implement service-oriented architectures (SOA) it is imperative that service-oriented thinking become an integral part of the business itself. We motivate the key concepts for service-oriented business thinking through a range of examples that give a flavor of a range of businesses. In this paper we establish three key concepts - service agreement, service transaction and service function. These concepts are discussed in depth and are related to our ongoing work in the area of modeling business services

Variable pricing business solutions in a decomposed business environment

Evolving business models and technology advances have facilitated the creation of innovative pricing strategies. Variable pricing represents the ability to configure a pricing schedule from a set of pricing options such as fixed cost, usage, shared benefit, and performance. The objective of variable pricing is to improve a pricing schedule for the mutual benefits of the provider and consumer, based on an evaluation of criteria that results in the setting of a price as a function of the expected value to be derived, as well as the time and materials used. In this paper, we focus on the variable pricing of ‘business solutions’, which is abstractly defined as the capabilities that enable or add value to the purposes of an enterprise. In a decomposed business environment, the structure of a business is partitioned into discrete business components that are assigned specific purposes and are endowed with resources to meet them. Business components interact to achieve business goals, and do so by exposing their capabilities through business services they offer. Business services have suitable levels of granularity offering constituent units of function, which, when selectively chosen and composed, form business solutions. We assert that business services are also suitable units for variable pricing, the implication being that pricing for a given business solution is an evaluation of the variable pricing of its assemblage of business services. The benefits of this ‘variable price composition’ approach offer greater accuracy for the pricing plan, coupled with increased flexibility to compose, modify, calculate and articulate pricing for business solutions.

Evaluation of IT portfolio options by linking to business services

The management of IT portfolios in most enterprises is a complex and challenging ongoing process. IT portfolios typically contain large numbers of inter-related elements. In this paper, we present a model and a method for determining and evaluating IT portfolio options for use as a decision aid in the ongoing management of the portfolio. Business benefits of the portfolio options are articulated by linking IT portfolio elements to componentized business services. Characteristics of the IT portfolio elements are abstracted to a level of granularity suited for portfolio analysis. Our model allows various forms of uncertainty that are utilized in the evaluation. Our evaluation method determines a set of portfolio options with the associated cost/benefits tradeoffs. Business constraints and pruning methods are used to present only the relevant and available options and their tradeoffs to the IT portfolio manager.