WfMC

From Q-BPM

WfMC is one of the non-profit international standardizing organizations of workflow management systems. It stands for Workflow Management Coalition.

1 Overview
2 Organization of WfMC
- 2.1 Committee
- 2.2 Working Group
3 Actvities of WfMC
4 Goals of WfMC
5 Movement of WfMC
6 Related Articles
7 References

Overview

WfMC is a non-profit international standardizing organization that is working on the standardization related to workflow through the international collaboration with OMG and OASIS. Its primary activities include "standardization of the language," "standardization of the terminology of workflow-related products," "standardization of interfaces for interconnection," etc. The standardizing activities by WfMC provide us with the following benefits, which result in invigoration of the workflow-related market.

Because it is the non-profit international organization, proposed standards tend to become international standards.
Cost to use products can be reduced.

The biggest achievement of standardization related to BPM is the release of XPDL (XML Process Definition Language). XPDL is one of Process Definition Language standards that are defined for the sake of interconversion of data files used in BPM-related products, and all graphic objects can be saved in XML format, which is text information. In October, 2005, "XPDL2.0," which adds the specification of mapping between BPMN and XPDL so that graphic objects in BPMN can be represented, was released.

Organization of WfMC

Over 300 member organizations are registered as representatives of wide range of concerned parties in workflow area, including vendors, users, researchers, and consultants. From Japan, NTT, Hitachi, Fujitsu, NEC, and Nihon Unisys participate in WfMC.

Committee

WfMC consists of three special committees. Committees are divided into three regions (Europe and Africa, North and South America, and Asia and Pacific).

The Technical Committee
The External Relations Committee
The Steering Committee

Primary committees have three-day conferences three times a year in North America and Europe alternately.

Working Group

What is Interoperability?
A property referring to the ability to work correctly when connected to different database, software, or network.

Each committee has 9 working groups.

Process Definition Interchange Model & APIs
Client/Application APIs
Workflow Interoperability
Administration & Monitoring
Participation in OMG
Participation in OASIS
Reference Model
Resource Model

Working groups are held for three days a year when needed.

What is API?
API is the acronym of Application Program Interface and is an interface that is used when an application uses features provided by other hardware or software.

Actvities of WfMC

Each working group defines its own activity goals and acts based on them. Concrete activity goals are shown below.

Definition of workflow terminology
Interoperability
Consistent workflow standard
Coordination of various users' needs
Support for distribution of information shown above to workflow user communities

Regulations etc. defined so far are shown below.

Conformance
Reference Model
Public Documents
XPDL
Wf-XML

Goals of WfMC

WfMC aims to achieve the following goals.

Enhance the investment value of customers by using business process techniques
Reduce risks when using BPM products and workflow products through the standardization of interoperability
Develop and expand the BPM market by focusing intensively on the commercial values of process management