topic Re: Activiti Modeler's future in Alfresco Archive

Activiti Modeler's future

mikrobe1 — Tue, 03 Jun 2014 08:49:52 GMT

Now that Alfresco Activiti Enterprise has been launched with a new web based modeling tool, what's the future of the current Activiti Modeler based on Signavio core components? Will it be abandoned in favor of the pay-per-use version?

Re: Activiti Modeler's future

trademak — Tue, 03 Jun 2014 12:37:00 GMT

Hi,

Good question. We are currently investigating if we can make the BPMN modeling in the Alfresco Activiti Editor available for free. If we make that Editor available for free, it makes sense to stop the development of the Activiti Modeler. Otherwise we would have to maintain 2 similar code bases. Do you think that would be a direction that would suit your requirements? We welcome any feedback.

Best regards,

Re: Activiti Modeler's future

mikrobe1 — Wed, 04 Jun 2014 13:39:27 GMT

Hi Tijs,
well, even though Signavio is a very well written piece of code, its UI is quite outdated. A refresh is very welcome.
I briefly tried Alfresco Activiti Editor and I must say I like it a lot (except for the properties panel that I think is less readable than the Signavio's one).
I hope that Alfresco Activiti Editor keeps the same flexibility of Signavio for what concerns extensible stencilsets and plugin, that allows to extend it with further functionalities by third parties.
Since we are now offering a solution that integrates and extends the current Activiti Modeler, I would be immensely happy if we could replace it with an open source version (Apache license) of Alfresco Activiti Editor.

Cheers
Mike

Re: Activiti Modeler's future

trademak — Fri, 06 Jun 2014 12:54:52 GMT

Hi Mike,

We will launch a new piece of functionality regarding stencil sets soon. So yes, that's an important part of the Alfresco Activiti Editor. When I was referring to making the Editor available for free, I meant the usage, not to open source it. What kind of offering do you currently have around the Activiti Modeler?

Best regards,

Re: Activiti Modeler's future

mikrobe1 — Fri, 06 Jun 2014 13:48:52 GMT

Ouch! I misunderstood. That's bad because if you stop the development of Activiti Modeler it means that the Oryx Editor project and Signavio core component project will be dead for good. Activiti Modeler is the only one still alive.
We have developed several stencilsets to be used with Activiti Modeler and we store stencilsets and diagrams into a graph db. I cannot disclose more though.
Anyway I plead you for considering to keep an editor open source along with Activiti Engine. It would be a great loss otherwise.

Re: Activiti Modeler's future

trademak — Tue, 17 Jun 2014 10:09:51 GMT

Thanks for your feedback Mike. We will definitely consider your feedback when deciding on the future of the Modeler open source project. I Would be interested to hear feedback from other Activiti users as well. If we would make the Alfresco Activiti Editor offering available for free I can imagine that this works for a lot of people as well.

Are you also willing to invest time in the Activiti Modeler open source project and make some contributions to the code?

Best regards,

Re: Activiti Modeler's future

b_schnarr — Tue, 17 Jun 2014 11:36:00 GMT

I am of the opinion that it is not mandatory that the modeler is open source. If the Alfresco Activiti Editor has the same (or even more) functionality as the modeler, it would be great if user could use it for free. Another important point is imho the integration in the Activiti Explorer. Is this considered?

Best regards
Ben

Re: Activiti Modeler's future

mikrobe1 — Thu, 19 Jun 2014 13:17:22 GMT

I would be happy to give my contribution to the open source project, but I don't know if I'd be good enough.
Regarding things I'm doing for my company, I'm not in charge of deciding the licensing strategy. Anyway Activiti engine will become a very important part of our offer and once we'll be ready to hit the market we'll probably give back to community part of our work.
I just read that Alfresco Activiti has been added with a stencilset editor: would it be a possible option for you to offer an opensource community edition that covers the current Activiti Modeler functionalities and an enterprise edition with advanced functionalities?

Kind Regards
Mike

Re: Activiti Modeler's future

trademak — Thu, 19 Jun 2014 16:53:47 GMT

Ok thanks. If the Activiti Engine is a very important part of your offering, it might make sense to do an OEM with Alfresco to get all the functionality you are looking for. You have to take into account that we have to get some return of our investment in the new Alfresco Activiti Editor as well. The Activiti Engine is and will be open source, so we have to generate the revenue from surrounding tools like the Alfresco Activiti Editor.

Best regards,

Re: Activiti Modeler's future

trademak — Thu, 19 Jun 2014 16:55:24 GMT

Thanks Ben. When we decide to have a free user option in the Alfresco Activiti Editor, we'll also consider the integration with the Activiti Explorer.

Best regards,

Re: Activiti Modeler's future

mikrobe1 — Fri, 20 Jun 2014 07:59:11 GMT

Hi Tijs,
I don't want to push this discussion further since your position is very clear.
Anyway let me clarify a couple of things about my previous statements:
We firstly customized Oryx and then seamlessly applied our implementation to Signavio Core Components and Activiti Modeler (since they are based on the same core code), we changed the UI style and we are happy with that. We don't need anything more than that.
My main interest was not to steal other's work but, because I consider Oryx (and its forks) a powerful modeler, I would be very happy to see it grow rather than dead.
Our solution can couple with _any_ process engine and we don't distribute Activiti Engine. I personally have a crush on Activiti because its code is very well written so if a customer will ask a recommendation, I would suggest to pick up Activiti but it is not integrated in our software.
I know everybody needs to have revenue to survive so I won't discuss this issue any longer.

Best,
Mike

Re: Activiti Modeler's future

trademak — Thu, 26 Jun 2014 09:12:17 GMT

Hi Mike,

Yes fully understood. The investment we did with the Activiti Modeler will remain open source of course. But right now there are no plans to enhance it other than from community pull requests.

Regards,

Re: Activiti Modeler's future

smirzai — Tue, 02 Dec 2014 20:58:42 GMT

Actually it seems a serious problem to me. Who wants an engine without a modeler ? or with a not maintained one.
I think it makes Activiti less favorable in comparison with its rivals. Specially considering Camunda new web based modeler initiation.

Re: Activiti Modeler's future

trademak — Wed, 03 Dec 2014 13:38:20 GMT

Hi Saeid, do you really mean this? We still merge pull requests for the Activiti Modeler so to say it's not maintained is not fair in my opinion. The Alfresco Activiti Cloud environment can be used for free, so that's available as well. And then in addition we also have the Eclipse Designer. And Camunda's new web based modeler is still in an early stage for real BPMN modeling. And we're still thinking about the option to make the Alfresco Activiti Cloud BPMN Editor open source as well. So lots of options and I really feel like you are overstating your concerns.

Best regards,

Re: Activiti Modeler's future

smirzai — Wed, 03 Dec 2014 14:17:39 GMT

hi Tijs
Thank you for clarifying. OK. Maybe I have used too strong word. It is going to be maintained.
But am I wrong on assuming that it is not going to be improved any more and only occasional contributions from community will be merged ?
And what did you mean in comment #2 of this thread ? You mentioned if using alfresco editor is decided to be free, then it makes sense to stop modeler. And when you say it is going to remain free, doen't it mean the modeler going to be closed ?
I do not think by free, you meant open source.

Re: Activiti Modeler's future

trademak — Thu, 04 Dec 2014 09:07:24 GMT

The current Activiti Modeler is Ext-JS based and we don't want to invest a lot of time to build new features on this legacy technology. But we'll keep maintaining it and build smaller features when necessary.

The Alfresco Activiti Cloud editor is available for free, so that's not to be decided, that's already the case. There's also a possibility that we'll open source the Alfresco Activiti Cloud BPMN editor and replace the current Activiti Modeler. But that's not decided yet.

Best regards,

Re: Activiti Modeler's future

smirzai — Thu, 04 Dec 2014 09:21:24 GMT

Hi Tijs,
It is much clearer for me now.
What are going to replace ext-JS with ?
an open source Alfresco Cloud BPMN editor would be awesome. A big vote from my side.

Re: Activiti Modeler's future

trademak — Thu, 04 Dec 2014 09:55:33 GMT

The Alfresco Activiti Cloud BPMN editor works with Angular JS instead of Ext-JS.

Best regards,

Re: Activiti Modeler's future

smirzai — Thu, 04 Dec 2014 09:56:23 GMT

looks great

Re: Activiti Modeler's future

mikrobe1 — Thu, 04 Dec 2014 10:51:45 GMT

I guess final decision will depend on how they consider Signavio now, a competitor or an old-friend-former-contributor, because opening the new modeler's source would cause serious headache to Signavio crew 😜
Maybe they have a "non-aggression pact" with them.