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Workflow Evolution

  • Living reference work entry
  • First Online:
Encyclopedia of Database Systems

  • 75 Accesses

Synonyms

Adaptive workflow/process management; Process evolution; Schema evolution in process management systems; Schema evolution in workflow management systems; Workflow/process instance changes

Definition

The term evolution has been originally used in biology and means the progressive development of a species over time, i.e., the adaptation to changing environmental requirements. Business processes (which are often called workflows when implemented and thus automated within a workflow management system) also “live” within an environment (e.g., the enterprise or the market). This environment is typically highly dynamic, and thus the running workflows have to adapt to these changing requirements – i.e., to evolve – in order to keep up with the ever-changing business environment and provide their users with the competitive edge.

Workflow evolution implies two basic challenges: change realization and change discovery. Change realization means that it must be technicallypossible to...

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Recommended Reading

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Ulm, Ulm, Germany

    Peter Dadam

  2. University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria

    Stefanie Rinderle-Ma

Authors
  1. Peter Dadam
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  2. Stefanie Rinderle-Ma
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Peter Dadam .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Georgia Institute of Technology College of Computing, Atlanta, Georgia, USA

    Ling Liu

  2. University of Waterloo School of Computer Science, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada

    M. Tamer Özsu

Section Editor information

  1. Dept. di Elettronica e Informazione, Politecnico di Milano, Piazza Leonardo da Vinci 32, 20133, Milan, Italy

    Barbara Pernici

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© 2016 Springer Science+Business Media LLC

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Dadam, P., Rinderle-Ma, S. (2016). Workflow Evolution. In: Liu, L., Özsu, M. (eds) Encyclopedia of Database Systems. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4899-7993-3_470-2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4899-7993-3_470-2

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, New York, NY

  • Online ISBN: 978-1-4899-7993-3

  • eBook Packages: Springer Reference Computer SciencesReference Module Computer Science and Engineering

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