Shuangxi Huang

Optimal service selection and composition for service-oriented manufacturing network

The management of services is the kernel content of service-oriented manufacturing. However, it is difficult to realise the integration and optimisation of services in an open environment, which contains large amounts randomicity and uncertainty. The key problem is how to realise the optimal service selection and composition. In this article, the comprehensive performance evaluation metrics for service-oriented manufacturing network is proposed, which combines the key performance indicators of services in business, service and implementation level. The performance evaluation model is brought forward to analyse the local and global performance. An uncertainty and genetic algorithm-based method is developed to realise the optimal service selection and composition in effective and efficient way.

Service-Oriented Business Process Modeling and Performance Evaluation based on AHP and Simulation

With the evolution of grid technologies and the application of service-oriented architecture (SOA), more and more enterprises are integrated and collaborated with each other in a loosely coupled environment. A business process in that environment, i.e., the service-oriented business process (SOBP), shows highly flexibility for its free selection and composition of different services. The performance of the business process usually has to be evaluated and predicted before its being implemented. And it has special features since it includes both business-level and IT-level attributes. However, the existing modeling and performance evaluation methods of business process are mainly concentrated on business-level performance. And the researches on service selection and composition are usually limited to the IT-level metrics. An extended activity-network-based SOBP Model, its three-level performance metrics, and the corresponding calculation algorithm are proposed to fulfill these requirements. The advantages of our method in SOBP modeling and performance evaluation are highlighted also.

Integrated partner selection and production-distribution planning for manufacturing chains

A model is developed to describe the characteristics of the manufacturing chain.A hybrid algorithm combining PSO and GA with learning scheme has been developed.A simple example is used to illustrate the approach.Performance of the approach is evaluated by solving a set of test problems.Analysis of results indicates that the proposed approach is efficient and effective. This paper presents an integrated approach to solve the partner selection, and production-distribution planning problem in the design of manufacturing chains operating under a multi-product, multi-stage, multi-production route, multi-machine, and multi-period manufacturing environment. Such a problem often occurs when manufacturing companies and material suppliers establish partnerships to form a virtual enterprise, a manufacturing chain, in which its members cooperate to capture rising market opportunities. An optimization model and a hybrid algorithm which combines particle swarm optimization and genetic algorithm with learning scheme are developed to derive the optimal decisions. The performance of the developed approach is illustrated by using a simple case problem and a set of randomly generated test problems. Indeed, it is shown that the proposed hybrid algorithm can outperform the conventional genetic algorithm, the particle swarm optimization and the genetic algorithm with learning scheme, and is therefore an excellent tool for designing optimal manufacturing chains.

Service-Oriented enterprise network performance analysis

The service-oriented architecture (SOA) and the model-driven architecture (MDA) have been recognized as major evolutionary steps in enterprise integration (EI) in service-oriented computing environments. Service-oriented enterprise (SOE) networks (SOEN) are emerging with the significant advances of EI, SOA, and MDA. However, the implementation and optimization of SOEN is still lacking integrated SOA, MDA, and performance analysis and optimization (PAO) methods. This paper introduces an integrated solution of SOA and MDA with a simulation-based three-stage PAO method with stage 1 being an analytic hierarchy process (AHP)-based comprehensive performance calculation for service matching and binding, stage 2 being a simulation-based comprehensive performance evaluation for business process/service composition, and stage 3 being a business process simulation-based performance optimization for SOEN. The SOE architecture, performance analysis framework, performance indicators, and performance operators are discussed. The system uses MDA as the system development philosophy, SOA as the system implementation infrastructure, and the simulation-based PAO methods to analyze and optimize the SOEN performance. A case study of the SOEN illustrates the usage of the integrated solution.

Implementation of a web-based collaborative process planning system

Under the networked manufacturing environment, all phases of product manufacturing involving design, process planning, machining and assembling may be accomplished collaboratively by different enterprises, even different manufacturing stages of the same part may be finished collaboratively by different enterprises. Based on the self-developed networked manufacturing platform eCWS(e-Cooperative Work System), a multi-agent-based system framework for collaborative process planning is proposed. In accordance with requirements of collaborative process planning, share resources provided by cooperative enterprises in the course of collaboration are classified into seven classes. Then a reconfigurable and extendable resource object model is built. Decision-making strategy is also studied in this paper. Finally a collaborative process planning system e-CAPP is developed and applied. It provides strong support for distributed designers to collaboratively plan and optimize product process though network.

Web-based engineering portal for collaborative product development

Nowadays, collaborative product development has become a strategic necessity to develop high quality products at low cost and with quick response time to market demand. Past decades have seen significant advances to collaborative product development. However, Enterprises are still confronted with some problems. Firstly, the research in strategic level of collaborative product development is lacking. There are no formal processes and models for collaborative product development. On the other hand, the full alignment between information system and collaborative business is still missing. The information system cannot adapt to the fast changed business. This paper aims to provide the strategy and reference business model for collaborative product development. And then, to support the implementation of strategy and model, a workflow and web service based engineering collaboration portal is developed. The workflow is used to model and execute the collaborative product development processes, and the web service is the implementing technology of the portal. The combination of workflow and web service can fit the gap between business and information system and achieve on-demand business.

SOA-Based Collaborative Modeling Method for Cross-Organizational Business Process Integration

Business process modeling is a key technology for cross-organizational business process integration. However, current modeling methods always fall short in describing complex collaboration relationship existing in business process integration in SOA-based collaborative environment. On the basis of existing multi-views business process model, a collaborative business process modeling method is presented to meet the above requirement in this paper. According to the analysis of inter-enterprise collaborative behavior, multi-enterprises collaborative meta-model integrating process, role, service and data is put forward. Then, on the foundation of collaborative meta-model, adopting model mapping method, existing business process model is transformed into multi-views collaborative business process model. The proposed method lays a solid foundation for cross-organizational business process integration.

Two Fuzzy Models for Multilayer Air Defense Disposition in Fuzzy Environment

In an uncertain air defense battle environment, the decision makers’ knowledge about air raid target and battlefield environment consists of vagueness instead of randomness. A great deal of uncertain factors are usually predicted by using decision makers’ knowledge. Fuzzy variable can overcome these difficulties in predicting these parameters. In this paper, the problem of air defense disposition with fuzzy parameters is studied based on credibility measure. Two new programming models with fuzzy variable are proposed for optimal air defense disposition. A hybrid intelligent algorithm based on fuzzy simulation, genetic algorithm and neural networks is presented for solving the proposed model problems. A numerical example is also presented to illustrate the modeling idea and the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm.

An Ontology---Based Semantic Cooperation Framework for Business Processes

Nowadays many functions within intra- and inter- enterprises have been encapsulated into Web services to enable platform independent integration and interoperation. To realize the enterprise applications, most Web services are composed as workflows based on Business Process Execute Language (BPEL). However, the absence of semantic information in processes reduces the efficiency of interoperation and cooperation among these Web services from different providers. In this paper, a novel framework to support semantic cooperation of business processes is proposed, which brings semantic information into processes through mapping OWL-S to BPEL and Web Service Definition Language (WSDL) documents, then Web services from various domains and enterprises can understand each other eventually. The framework is being implemented under Project ImportNET.

The Methodology, Platform and Solution for Service-Oriented Enterprise

Although significant advances have been seen in service oriented architecture (SOA) experiences. In practice the adoption of SOA at enterprise level is a long-term and complex transformation process. The research on how to extend SOA into an organizational context is still rare. In this paper, model-driven development methodology and platform is presented to handle the complexity of transforming an enterprise into a Service-Oriented Enterprise (SOE). The reference architecture and implementation guide for SOE is described in the methodology. The model-driven platform provides the integrated development and operational environment for SOE. Based on the platform, a total solution for SOE is given which can implement on-demand business.