Comparing workflow specification languages: A matter of views

  • Authors:
  • Serge Abiteboul;Pierre Bourhis;Victor Vianu

  • Affiliations:
  • INRIA Saclay, ENS Cachan and University Paris-Sud;University Paris-Sud and University of Oxford;University of California, San Diego, CA

  • Venue:
  • ACM Transactions on Database Systems (TODS)
  • Year:
  • 2012

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Abstract

We address the problem of comparing the expressiveness of workflow specification formalisms using a notion of view of a workflow. Views allow to compare widely different workflow systems by mapping them to a common representation capturing the observables relevant to the comparison. Using this framework, we compare the expressiveness of several workflow specification mechanisms, including automata, temporal constraints, and pre-and postconditions, with XML and relational databases as underlying data models. One surprising result shows the considerable power of static constraints to simulate apparently much richer workflow control mechanisms.