Business Process Management with JBoss jBPM: A Practical Guide for Business Analysts (Paperback)

by Matt Cumberlidge (Author)
Key Phrases: protected mode, task node, server name, Bland Records, File Folder, Executable Jar File (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description

A Practical Guide for Business Analysts

Develop business process models for implementation in a business process management system.

• Map your business processes in an efficient, standards-friendly way
• Use the jBPM toolset to work with business process maps, create a customizable user interface for users to interact with the process, collect process execution data, and integrate with existing systems.
• Use the SeeWhy business intelligence toolset as a Business Activity Monitoring solution, to analyze process execution data, provide real-time alerts regarding the operation of the process, and for ongoing process improvement
• Set up business rules, assign tasks, work with process variables, automate activities and decisions.

In Detail

JBoss jBPM is a free, open-source, business process management solution. It enables users to create business processes that coordinate people, applications, and services.

A business process is a sequence of activities triggered by a certain input that results in a valuable output. Business Process Management is about analyzing those activities in a structured way and eventually supporting their execution with a workflow application. This allows for the following results:

• Better management visibility of their business: improved decision making
• Low cost of inputs: de-skilled labor requirements, less waste, standardized components
• Better outputs: consistent quality, more customer satisfaction

Businesses have always tried to manage their processes, but software such as jBPM brings the methodology and management theory to practical life.

JBoss jBPM offers the following key features:

• Graphical process definition
• Flexibility to integrate code into the graphical process definition
• A customizable web-based workflow application that runs the process you've defined
• Easy programming model to extend the graphical process definition
• A process-oriented programming model (jPDL) that blends the best of process definition languages and Java.
• Easy to integrate with other systems through the JBoss middleware suite.

What you will learn from this book?

This book will teach business analysts:

• What a business process is and why you would want to manage it
• How to map your business process
• Eliminating waste from the process
• How to define roles and responsibilities within the process
• Taking your process map into the jBPM toolset
• Activities/States and decision points
• How to work with process variables
• Automating activities/decisions where possible
• Setting up business rules: task assignment
• Business Activity Monitoring: analyzing process execution data, conducting ongoing process improvement

The book covers tasks that are common to all BPM implementations, but focuses on implementation in the popular and free jBPM.

Approach

This book takes a practical approach, with step-by-step instructions for business process management, model creation, and implementation. The book uses a typical BPM project lifecycle case study to explore and explain the process in a realistic situation.

Who this book is written for?

This is a book for Business Analysts (BAs) who need to develop a process model for implementation in a business process management system. Developers looking at the JBoss jBPM toolset will also find it a useful introduction to the key concepts.

This book is a full toolkit for someone who wants to implement BPM in the right way. This toolkit is particularly aimed at Business Analysts, although Project Managers, IT managers, developers, and even business people can expect to find useful tools and techniques in here. We will present the project framework, analysis techniques and templates, BPM technology and example deliverables that you need to successfully bring a BPM solution into your organization.

Product Details

• Paperback: 220 pages
• Publisher: Packt Publishing (July 30, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 184719236X
• ISBN-13: 978-1847192363
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 7.3 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #243,024 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Solid book For Getting Started With jBPM, January 13, 2008

By	Russell Olsen - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

A couple of interesting things happened to me recently. I have been designing a system with a workflow side to it and the thinking was that the JBoss jBPM workflow engine might be a good fit. So I was wading into the documentation to see if I could make some sense of the thing. Like a lot of large software products, jBPM comes complete a circus full of acrobat files, documentation that is detailed, in depth and kind of, well, incomprehensible. At least for the beginner. I'm sure once I get out of this initial spin up phase, I'll soon have all of my business processes humming along, but I have to admit that so far it has been rough going.

Which brings us to the second interesting event: out of the blue I got an email from the PackIt publishing company asking if I would like to review one of their books, Business Process Management With JBoss jBPM by Matt Cumberlidge. They would even send me a free copy. It is dangerous to ignore luck like that and so here we are.

Cumberlidge's book opens with an outline of what can only be described as the business process management philosophy: understand your business process, automate it (or a part of it) with a workflow engine and then iterate to improve. The book then launches into its single case study, the heart wrenching adventures of Bland Records in its quest to turn musical talent into profit. Thank goodness - if I have to sit through one more online pet store implementation I was going to get violent. After taking us through an analysis of the Bland workflow (aren't they all bland?) Mr. Cumberlidge, talks briefly about the architecture of jPBM and then jumps right into is main topic: the details of getting jPBM set up and flowing that work.

And I do mean the details - this book starts by explaining how to install Java and moves on to using the jPBM Eclipse plugin to build the workflow definition. From there we segway into creating jBPM based user interfaces and deploying the whole thing (in JBoss, naturally). We finish up by discussing such real world issues as monitoring your workflow, sending email alerts when your process starts to smell a bit fishy, and deciding if the whole effort was worthwhile.

There is a lot of detail in this book - many, many screenshots, lots of handholding through menus and dialogs. Perhaps a little too much for me, but I'll make allowances since Cumberlidge's focus is so squarely on helping the reader become productive with jBPM rapidly. The details are all very Windows oriented, but this Linux/Mac user had no trouble translating them into my OS as needed.

Aside from the technical content, there are a couple of things I really like about the book. The text is clearly written (if just a tiny bit wordy). Best of all, Mr. Cumberlidge writes in an easy, informal style. There is none of the "consider this" and "therefore it may be concluded that" nonsense that makes so many technical books read like 700 pages of stereo instructions. Be aware that this is a very focused book: it is less like "jPBM The Missing Manual" and more like "jPBM The Missing Quickstart Guide". Still, Business Process Management With JBoss jBPM is a competent book that fills a real gap.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent starting guide to jBPM, March 20, 2008

By	D. SALTER (UK) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This book is described as A Practical Guide for Business Analysts and is intended for Business Analysts who are not familiar with, or who are new to the JBoss jBPM system.

The book takes an iterative approach to Business Process Management (BPM) and starts by describing why we might need BPM and what its benefits to an organization might be. The first chapter of the book continues to describe some scenarios where BPM is expected to be beneficial to a company (for example "Processes are carried out in disparate teams" and where BPM would not be used (for example where it would impose a disproportionate burden on a small business). Chapter 1 ends by introducing a suggested six-phase project lifecycle, which is described within the remaining chapters in the book.

The first stage of implementing BPM describes how to set up a BPM project and includes details on Project Initiation Documents, scoping the process, process analysis and scoping out the process workflow. Sample activity diagrams and project documentation (e.g. RACI matrices) are provided as examples.

After describing the business process, the book details how to model the process using JBoss jBPM including details of how to install the jBPM engine, the JBoss application Server and the jBPM designer. The jBPM designer is an Eclipse plugin, so some readers of the book may already be familiar with this application. It should be stated however that the target audience for this book is not software developers, but Business Analysts (although there are sections within the book on how to customise jBPM processes using Java code). This section on implementing a process using JBoss jBPM is one of the larger chapters in the book and covers details of jPDL (Process Definition Language). As with the rest of the book, this is described in a clear and easy to understand tutorial approach that should provide the readers with sufficient information to build their own processes after completing the book.

In order to deploy and test the business process on JBoss jBPM, a user interface is required which is the subject of the next chapter in the book. This chapter described how web based user interfaces can be automatically generated from within the process editor and then customised by a business analyst. The web based user interfaces are defined using Java Server Faces (JSF) with the Facelets view technology. The book does not go into great depth about either of these technologies, rather it assumes the Business Analyst will be making minor modifications to these pages.

The sample process within the book is developed and deployed onto a standalone JBoss workstation. Details are provided however on how to deploy the project onto a production server using a production ready database.

Sometimes within a business process it is necessary to invoke custom actions that can be developed using Java code. A brief description is provided showing how to develop a custom action to extract data from a process and insert it into a separate database. This is provided as an overview of how custom actions can be developed, however the focus of the book is on developing and deploying business processes in an iterative manner rather than on in depth analysis of the Java code required to develop custom actions.

Finally the book concludes with details of how process monitoring can be achieved using the SeeWhy business intelligence platform.

This book follows a tutorial style approach describing an iterative procedure for developing BPM applications deployed to the JBoss jBPM engine. The book takes the reader through the whole project lifecycle, from identifying target processes, building prototypes and finally getting project sign-off. The style of the book is easy to read whilst still remaining informative. This book is recommended for Business Analysts using or looking to use the JBoss jBPM suite of tools

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Nice Overview of Process Management With JBoss jBPM, August 28, 2007

By	Daniel McKinnon (Tewksbury, MA USA) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)

'Business Process Management with JBoss jBPM' by Matt Cumberlidge is a book targeted at business analysts and product managers who are looking to streamline the process of managing software development. This book spans over 200 pages and content is laid out over 7 chapters. From laying out how jBPM is to be used to setting up your first process management workflow to learning how to get the most out of this great tool, this book is perfect for all relevant industry people who are looking to improve efficiency and results.

I usually look for brevity in books but I felt that another 50 pages or so probably would have made for a better end result. This book does exactly what it says it is going to do and does it well, but I felt that it could have had a little more content and that is why I didn't give this a 5th star.

Good book for going from prototype to end result for all people in the field and a book I recommend picking up.

**** RECOMMENDED