JP4158321B2 - Process design support apparatus and method - Google Patents

Description

[0001]
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to design techniques for various processes such as business processes, production processes, design processes, and business processes, and in particular, process description data is made into a library and used during process design.
[0002]
[Background technology]
When using past design information in process design, the task of separating and using a process as a functional element from a series of process descriptions has been left to the designer. Also, even if functional elements of processes in different fields are abstracted, there are functional elements that can be used for process design in other fields with a slight modification. It was left behind. Therefore, reuse of past design information had to depend on the amount of knowledge depending on the designer's experience and the ability of abstraction diversion. The present invention is intended to solve such problems.
[0003]
[Problems to be solved by the invention]
The present invention has been made in consideration of the above-described circumstances. In the process description in which a process is described as a chain of activities, a condition on which an activity can be linked to an activity is described in advance. An object of the present invention is to provide a process design support technology that supports process design by presenting configurable activities and candidate combinations of activities at the time of design.
[0004]
[Means for Solving the Problems]
In order to solve the above-mentioned problems, the present inventors have conducted intensive research, and as a result, have come to adopt the method adopted in the modular program.
[0005]
Generally, in the world of programming languages used in computers, connection conditions such as arguments and return values between program modules are explicitly described, and a program is inspected based on the connection conditions when compiling. Yes. Similarly, for general-purpose program modules such as class libraries provided in object-oriented languages, add connection modules that explicitly describe connection conditions and wait for connection conditions using mechanisms such as subcrushing and delegation. Realized.
[0006]
In the present invention, the concept of a programming language is applied to process design such as business processes, so that connection conditions can be described for activities constituting the process, explicitly described as a library, and designed during process design. Support process design by making it easy to find processes that can be connected to any activity in the process.
[0007]
Furthermore, if you want to search for a wide range of connectable processes or if you want to search within a range of strict conditions, the connection conditions of activities from the abstract level with weak restrictions to the concrete level with strong restrictions in advance, Processes can be described at any stage, and processes that can be connected to any activity in the process being designed can be searched at any level according to the granularity, precision, and amount of search results of the design. To support process design.
[0008]
The processes in the present invention include, for example, dependency relationships between software applications, dependency relationships between information systems, dependency relationships between manufacturing processes, supply chains, workflows, and business processes.
[0009]
The resources here are represented by substances, energy, information, for example, raw materials, processing equipment, storage locations, transportation means, workers, hot water, environmental conditions, regulations, work instructions, signals, funds And complex resources represented by their combination pattern and input / output timing.
[0010]
Regarding the description of these resources, it is not necessary to describe all possible resources as described above in all work processes, and it is sufficient to describe only the dominant resources in the work process design. For example, temperature and air need not be described as resources in the information processing process, but must be described as resources in the agricultural production process.
[0011]
Various features of the present invention are as set forth in the claims. These various features are also described in detail below. Note that the present invention can be realized as a method invention, and at least a part of the method can be realized by computer software. Further, it is a matter of course that a recording medium recording such computer software and a recording medium recording computer software for installing such computer software in a computer system are also included in the technical scope of the present invention. .
[0012]
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
Hereinafter, the present invention will be described in detail.
[0013]
FIG. 1 shows an embodiment of the present invention as a whole. In this figure, a process design support system according to an embodiment includes an input means 10, a database management means 11, a storage means 12, a search means 13, an editing means 14, and the like. The display device 15 is included. The input means 10 is, for example, a keyboard or a mouse device, and inputs information related to activities constituting the process, information related to the chain between activities, and information related to connection conditions when the activities are combined with other activities. The database management means 11 is a well-known database management system, for example, and classifies and systematically manages the input information. The storage unit 12 is, for example, a well-known database, and stores the above-described input information and management information. The search means 13 is a conventional search tool, for example, and searches for information stored in the storage means 12. The editing means 14 is, for example, a conventional editor tool, and is used for constructing / reconstructing a process. The display device 15 is a CRT display, for example, and displays various operation states.
[0014]
FIG. 2 shows a procedure for constructing a database for process design support, and FIG. 3 shows an outline flow of a design procedure using stored information accumulated in the database constructed by the procedure of FIG.
[0015]
In FIG. 2, the database is constructed as follows.
[Step S10]: A process is described as a chain of activities.
[Step S11]: An activity connection condition is described for each activity .
[Step S10]: The activity is registered in the database (accumulation means 12).
[0016]
The above processing is described for each process and registered in the database. The above processing can be performed using the input means 10, the display device 15, the editing means 14, etc. of the process design support system (FIG. 1).
[0017]
In FIG. 3, the process design procedure is performed as follows.
[Step S20]: A process is described as a chain of activities.
[Step S21]: The search means 13 is used to search the database (accumulation means 12) for activities related to each activity to be designed.
[Step S22]: The search result is used / improved to refine the process.
[Step S23]: It is determined whether or not the detailed design at the target level has been reached. When the target level is reached, the process is terminated. If not, the process returns to step S20 and continues.
[0018]
Through the above processing, related activities are retrieved and extracted from the connection conditions and reused for process design.
[0019]
FIG. 4 shows connection conditions of activities, conditions for connection between activities constituting a process, conditions of resources consumed by the activities (input resources), conditions of resources produced by the activities (output resources), The example of the process model described for every activity by the three conditions of the conditions regarding the dependency relation between all the resources handled by the activity is shown.
[0020]
Candidate activities that can be linked to any activity are searched by attribute search of these three conditions. Then, use the search results and refine the process description. Searches are similarly performed for activities newly described in the detailed process description, and the design is completed when the target process description level is achieved.
[0021]
FIG. 5 shows a process design flow using such a process model. 5, portions corresponding to those in FIG. 3 are denoted by corresponding reference numerals, and detailed description thereof is omitted. In step S31, attributes and attributes relating to the three conditions of the condition relating to the resource (input resource) used by the activity for the connection condition, the condition relating to the resource (output resource) provided by the activity, and the condition relating to the dependency between the two types of resources. Activities are searched for and used in design by a search method consisting of logical operations on values.
[0022]
FIG. 6 shows an activity data model and procedure when the connection condition between activities in FIG. 5 is described as a plurality of stages from a weak level to a strong level.
In this figure, portions corresponding to those in FIGS. 2, 3, and 5 are denoted by corresponding reference numerals, and detailed description thereof is omitted. In step S41 (database construction), the conditions for connection between activities are described step by step with the strength of constraints. In step S51 (process design support), the connection condition includes a condition related to a resource (input resource) used by the activity, a condition related to a resource provided by the activity (output resource), and a condition related to the dependency relationship between the two types of resources. Using the logical operation of attributes and attribute values related to the three conditions, and the strength of the constraint conditions, the activities are searched and used in the design.
[0023]
FIG. 7 shows a procedure for describing a connection condition between activities using a terminology specified in advance and performing a search using a terminology thesaurus. Also in this figure, portions corresponding to those in FIGS. 2, 3, and 5 are denoted by corresponding reference numerals, and detailed description thereof is omitted. In this flow, a terminology describing a condition is used for a condition description when an activity is registered in a database using a classification structure (thesaurus dictionary) hierarchically classified by an abstract-concrete relationship (S61). Manage hierarchically and integratedly from the level of loose conditions (high level of abstraction) to the level of severe conditions (low level of abstraction). The initial stage of design is to search and examine existing activities that can be used for design by candidate activities with loose conditions (high abstract level). In the process of becoming strict, an activity candidate that can be implemented is searched by searching for an activity candidate having a severe condition (low abstract level) (S71). Then, use the search results and refine the process description. Searches are similarly performed for activities newly described in the detailed process description, and the design is completed when the target process description level is achieved.
[0024]
FIG. 8 also shows a procedure for supporting process design by searching for activities that convert resources and resolving connections of activities with different connection conditions in order to enable connections between activities that do not match the connection conditions. Show. In this figure, portions corresponding to those in FIG. 2 are denoted by corresponding reference numerals, and detailed description thereof is omitted. In this example, in step S81, a process is constructed by searching for an activity for connecting activities whose connection conditions do not match.
[0025]
Although the above embodiment has been described as a stand-alone system, it is needless to say that a server / client system can be used through a local network or a wide area network.
[0026]
【The invention's effect】
As described above, according to the present invention, when describing a process as a chain of activities and designing a process, connection conditions between activities are determined, and activities of past process examples are retrieved from these connection conditions and extracted. The process design can be performed efficiently because the process is reused.
[Brief description of the drawings]
FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing an embodiment of the present invention as a whole.
FIG. 2 is a flowchart illustrating a database construction procedure according to the above embodiment.
FIG. 3 is a flowchart for explaining a process design procedure according to the embodiment.
FIG. 4 is a diagram illustrating a process model used in a specific configuration example of the above embodiment.
FIG. 5 is a flowchart illustrating a process design procedure using the process model of FIG. 4;
FIG. 6 is a flowchart for explaining another specific configuration example of the embodiment.
FIG. 7 is a flowchart for explaining still another specific configuration example of the embodiment.
FIG. 8 is a flowchart for explaining another specific configuration example of the embodiment.
[Explanation of symbols]
DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 10 Input means 11 Database management means 12 Storage means 13 Search means 14 Editing means 15 Display apparatus

Claims (3)

In the process design apparatus describing the process as a chain of activities, activities the connection conditions of activities, including conditions related to resources conditions and activities related resources to be used to provide, written in canned terms in the vocabulary attributes Database management means for storing activity information as a database for each activity, dictionary means for hierarchically classifying terms in the vocabulary according to abstract-concrete relationships between the terms, and terms for specifying search contents And an input means for inputting a range of abstract-concrete relations of the dictionary means, and an activity in which a term is included in the term specified by the input means and the range of the hierarchy from the accumulated activity information information, the search means dictionary means with reference to the search, based on the selection input to select the retrieved activity information, to determine the chain of activities Process design support apparatus configured to include a editing means constituting the process. The search means further searches the activity information stored for the activities that can be connected between the two activities for two activities that do not match the connection conditions, and the editing means searches for the searched activities. The process design support apparatus according to claim 1 , wherein a chain of activities is determined based on a selection input for selecting .   The process design support apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the connection condition further includes a condition relating to a resource used by the activity for the connection condition and a dependency relationship of the resource provided by the activity.

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