Workflow Patterns
Workflow Patterns is a research-based collection of recurring capabilities and problems in process-aware information systems and workflow languages. Its principal perspectives are control flow, data, resource assignment, exception handling, and event-log imperfections.
Cohesive Correspondence
| Workflow perspective | Cohesive correspondence |
|---|---|
| Control-flow patterns | process-graph sequencing, choice, concurrency, synchronization, merge, cancellation, recurrence, and completion structure |
| Data patterns | values, observations, process coordination state, shapes, input/output placement, and flow views |
| Resource patterns | observer models, authority, scheduling, arbitration, work assignment, people, agents, and runtimes |
| Exception-handling patterns | Timeout, cancellation, retry, compensation, recovery, escalation, and terminal process outcomes |
| Event-log imperfection patterns | observability and provenance, missing or ambiguous evidence, ordering, correlation, and process-mining data quality |
Workflow control flow means branch, token, and process progression. It is distinct from EIP's interaction control flow, which identifies the active driver of a distributed interaction. One workflow edge may lower into several push, pull, queue, driver, call, timer, or shared-state interactions.
The catalog is especially useful for assessing whether a process language or workflow engine can express required structures. Structural support is not sufficient realization evidence: durable joins, waits, cancellation, exclusive signal consumption, late input, recovery, and migration require explicit operational semantics.
Boundary of Adoption
A workflow pattern does not define the domain purpose or authority of a process. Exclusive Choice supplies branch structure; it does not decide which domain policy may choose a branch. Multiple Instances supplies cardinality structure; it does not identify the business subjects or completion meaning. Resource assignment supplies a work-allocation shape; it does not grant domain authority merely because a worker is scheduled.
External References
- Workflow Patterns Initiative, Workflow Patterns.
- Workflow Patterns Initiative, Control-Flow Patterns.
- Wil M. P. van der Aalst, Arthur H. M. ter Hofstede, Bartek Kiepuszewski, and Alistair P. Barros, Workflow Patterns, Distributed and Parallel Databases 14:5-51, 2003.
Related concepts: pattern languages and correspondence, process theories, process, process graphs, flow views, interaction control flow, workflow engines, durable execution, scheduling, arbitration, authority, recovery, observability and provenance.