Business Process Definitions(BPD)

The Business Process Definition is at the heart of every IBM BPM solution. It provides the model for the business process and is established early on in the design phase. This enables easier changes over time. From a high level, a BPD is a diagram that gives an overview and the flow of a process. It will normally be created by the Business Process Analyst through discussions and interviews with other staff members.

Suppose, for example, that you're doing a rough sketch of the business process involved in approving a loan. You're in a meeting room with a whiteboard, and you're discussing the process of approving a loan, drawing on a whiteboard diagram of flowchart-like blocks.

This can be exactly modeled in IBM BPM as a Business Process Definition using the tool of the IBM BPM Process Designer. The message stays, but with the help of IBM BPM PD, it becomes easier to manipulate and drag-and-drop blocks around without the necessity of deleting and redrawing.

Moreover, even in the meeting where the process is being explained, the attendees can be remote and, on their screens, have the same diagram of the process. Business Process Definition is diagram style in an industry-standard format for Business Process Model and Notation (BPMN).

A Business Process Definition is named and saved as part of a Process Application solution when created. Creation occurs within the IBM BPM PD tool, located in the library section under the category Processes.

The Wizard for the Business Process Definition asks for the name of the new BPD to be created.

When created, it opens up in the main canvas area of the BPD editor.

This main area, called the canvas, is where we model the process solution in picture form. Icons representing activities, and other process elements, can be dragged from the right-hand palette of the window and dropped on the canvas. These icons are then strung together with Sequence Lines. Each icon represents a "step" in the process.

Pools and Lanes

Imagine this as if it were an Olympic swimming competition, with multiple swimmers competing against each other for the best time. Multiple swimmers swim in the same pool but are confined to their respective lanes. Now, take this very model and apply it to the canvas drawing area in the BPD editor: the whole canvas is the pool, and lanes can be added to divide the pool into horizontal sections. When an icon is dropped in a diagram, its vertical position indicates that it belongs to one of the lanes. Two important consequences of this are: if a lane corresponds to a particular "role" in the process, you can tell at a glance which activities are associated with which roles just by looking along that lane. Another example could be that some attributes assigned to a lane are inherited by all activities contained within that lane.

Sequence Lines

Sequence lines are the links between individual steps in a BPD, and indicate the order of activities when the process runs, by having an arrow that points to the next activity. Within Process Designer there is an icon which toggles on Sequence line drawing mode. When this mode is on, the cursor changes to show a "plug," indicating that a connector is dragging from one component to another. As the cursor passes over an element that can either be the source or target of a sequence line, the element highlights attachment points to guide the connection.

To create a wire between two elements, enter wiring mode by clicking on a source element, then hover over an attachment point on the source element. You can "grab" an attachment point by clicking, holding and releasing on it. Move the cursor (without clicking) over the target element. A line will automatically be drawn from the source to the target. When you hover over the trigger element, you will see the attachment points again. Move your cursor over one of the attachment points and click and hold, release, and then click and release again. The two elements will now be connected with a Sequence Line.

A Sequence Line is a connection that can have either its source or target changed. Clicking on it allows one of the ends of the line to be dragged to another element.

When a Sequence Line is clicked on, more "control points" can be added via the rightmouse menu. Control points are additional junctions on the line that provide the facility to alter the lay-out and appearance of it to achieve enhanced visualizations of the diagram. It can help enhance the diagram's total appearance. Control points can be dragged with the mouse to re-orientate the line.

Moreover, if a Sequence Line is used as output of a conditional gateway, the name given to the line will appear in the description of conditions inside the gateways, which define which alternative path to take.

A condition of a decision gateway can also be shown in the properties of the line.

Finally, there could be an attribute called Line Type that is either "Happy Path" or "Exception Path." These do not impact the working of a process and are mainly used during process analysis. They can usually be ignored.