topic Re: Importing BPMN models from Aris in Alfresco Archive

Importing BPMN models from Aris

htmfilho — Mon, 08 Aug 2011 17:49:28 GMT

Is there any success case of sistematically import BPMN models from Aris? Can you give details about that? Any incompatibility? Known issue? etc?Thanks in advance!

Re: Importing BPMN models from Aris

trademak — Mon, 08 Aug 2011 18:57:35 GMT

Import it where? Directly into the Engine?
The Engine should be able to run BPMN 2.0 compliant XML processes, so if Aris does this it should be no problem.

Best regards,

Re: Importing BPMN models from Aris

htmfilho — Tue, 09 Aug 2011 04:48:55 GMT

Yes, export from Aris and import directly into the engine. As you said, this is something logical to happen once the XML is compliant. I'm gonna try this week and post comments here, but I'm looking for someone who already did that before to share his/her experience.

In my organization people use Aris to model processes. The architecture team would like to recommend Activiti to implement workflows, but the compatibility with Aris must be something close to 100%.

Re: Importing BPMN models from Aris

trademak — Tue, 09 Aug 2011 06:23:51 GMT

Okay. Does this mean you're only using workflow related functionality. Because service tasks will be hard to deploy directly from Aris.

Best regards,

Re: Importing BPMN models from Aris

htmfilho — Tue, 09 Aug 2011 13:59:48 GMT

It is not our intention to use Signavio as a modeling tool, but according to this website: http://www.signavio.com/en/products/process-editor-on-premise.html, reusing already existing process models, E.g. from ARIS® or Visio, needs an individual offer from Signavio for migration of existing process models.

Btw, the XML exported by Aris is really different from this one:

<bpmn:definitions id="ID_1" …>
   <bpmn:extension mustUnderstand="true" definition="bpmn:dataRequirements"/>
   <bpmn:task name="Retrieve Customer Record" id="ID_2">
      <bpmn:dataInput name="Order Input" id="ID_3">
         <bpmn:typeDefinition typeRef="bo:smileysurprised:rder" id="ID_4"/>
      </bpmn:dataInput>
      <bpmn:dataOutput name="Customer Record Output" id="ID_5">
         <bpmn:typeDefinition typeRef="bo:CustomerRecord" id="ID_6"/>
      </bpmn:dataOutput>
      <bpmn:inputSet name="Inputs" id="ID_7" dataInputRefs="ID_3"/>
      <bpmn:smileysurprised:utputSet name="Outputs" id="ID_8" dataOutputRefs="ID_5"/>
   </bpmn:task>
</bpmn:definitions>

… extracted from the BPMN 2 standard document. Still investigating the matter.

Re: Importing BPMN models from Aris

jbarrez — Wed, 10 Aug 2011 12:54:47 GMT

That looks like normal BPMN 2.0 to me. It should be importable.

I wasnt aware Aris was capable of BPMN 2.0 export?

Re: Importing BPMN models from Aris

ronald_van_kuij — Wed, 10 Aug 2011 13:39:33 GMT

Maybe this snippet is identical to bpmn 1.0 🙂

Re: Importing BPMN models from Aris

trademak — Wed, 10 Aug 2011 15:27:31 GMT

The problem is probably the task element. Activiti supports implementations of the task element, userTask, serviceTask etc not just the task element.

Best regards,

Tijs

Re: Importing BPMN models from Aris

htmfilho — Wed, 10 Aug 2011 18:16:07 GMT

I said…

Btw, the XML exported by Aris is REALLY DIFFERENT from this one:

So, Aris doesn't export to BPMN, but it imports from everything.

In case we decide to adopt Activiti, then we have to duplicate parts of the model that is going to be implemented. It is a tough work. Here, if you print the models you get easily 500 pages A4. uuuuh!

Re: Importing BPMN models from Aris

trademak — Wed, 10 Aug 2011 20:55:09 GMT

Yes, indeed. But that XML example is also not valid to import in the Activiti Engine.
If you use Aris as the modeling tool and if it's not able to export to BPMN that's a problem.
As you already said, the commercial Signavio product is able to import Aris models, so that could be a good option.

Best regards,

Re: Importing BPMN models from Aris

htmfilho — Thu, 11 Aug 2011 04:33:03 GMT

Yes, indeed. But that XML example is also not valid to import in the Activiti Engine.

That XML example I extracted directly from the BPMN 2 Standard documentation (http://www.omg.org/spec/BPMN/2.0/PDF/), page 61. If Activiti is not able to import this, then what exactly Activiti is able to import?

If you use Aris as the modeling tool and if it's not able to export to BPMN that's a problem.

From my understanding, Aris must be connected to the technology that is going to run the process. Oracle BPM, for example. That's a proprietary approach, which might be incompatible with Activiti approach.

Re: Importing BPMN models from Aris

jbarrez — Thu, 11 Aug 2011 09:52:16 GMT

that XML example I extracted directly from the BPMN 2 Standard documentation (http://www.omg.org/spec/BPMN/2.0/PDF/), page 61. If Activiti is not able to import this, then what exactly Activiti is able to import?

Activiti supports every element documented in the user guide http://activiti.org/userguide/index.html#bpmn20

A 'task' is parsed by the engine, and treated as a no-op (pass through).

Re: Importing BPMN models from Aris

matias — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 15:16:20 GMT

Hildeberto,

Were you able to import BPMN models from Aris? How did you do?

Thanks,

Matias