E-Business Framework for an Efficient Capture and Implementation of End-to-End Transactions (EFFICIENT)

Coordinating Institution: CRP Henri Tudor
From: 01/11/2001
To: 31/12/2007
Budget: 1,274,981.00€
Contact(s): Dubois Eric , Ramel Sophie

Summary :

As e-business exchanges grow more complex and more often consist in full transactions, compared to exchanges of individual messages, the need to express them in a precise and easily understandable manner grows for business experts. In addition, even if the ebXML UMM method proposes the use of UML as the modeling language for these transactions, UML is not always precise and not sufficient to capture all the semantics of B2B transactions. Moreover, complex transactions described by these UML diagrams are not always easy to grasp for business experts, which can lead to errors. The goal of the Efficient project is to help in the creation, the modeling, the improvement and the validation of these transactions by business experts without IT knowledge.

The Efficient project focused first on the modeling of e-business transactions, by developing a modeling language based on UML 2.0 and implementing a plug-in to the UML case tool MagicDraw UML (selected after an initial tools survey). The project created a methodology and a toolset to validate the modeled transactions: an “animator” tool allows business experts to “play” the transaction they model.

Each actor can fill and receive business messages of the transaction in a web interface, and thus better understand the model and eventually detect errors. In addition, the project produced a method, called Chaining, taking as an input a general business idea, and producing a first version of a transaction model. This method works by successive refinements of requirements expressed by business experts, and the selection of existing transaction patterns based on these requirements.

In addition to improvements to this chaining method and its application in a case study, the year 2007 was mostly devoted to extending the expressiveness of the language and the functionalities of the tools. In particular, we have finished the implementation of the mechanism for reusing existing business patterns. We also integrated a new, open source, business rules language and engine into the modeling language and tools: after a study of existing business rules engines, we selected JBoss Rules (also called Drools) to express and verify constraints on the model that cannot be expressed in UML. Finally, we increased the interoperability level of our tools by adding support to existing standards, and in particular to WS-BPEL 2.0. The goal of this last step was to facilitate the use of Efficient even in contexts were other modeling tools are already used. Collaborations: (synergies that were not specified in the convention) a. Scientific collaborations in the context of the EU-Network of Excellence (NOE) INTEROP with the universities of Twente (NL), Amsterdam (NL), Namur (BE), Lausanne (CH), Stockholm (SE). b. Contribution to a taught course on electronic business at the university of Namur (BE). c. Collaboration with the university of Vienne (AU) and UN/CEFACT TMWG with regards to the utilization of Efficient as a tool in B2B transaction standardization. d. Development and deployment of a demonstrator for eGovernment services for the Republic of Vietnam in the framework of the EU project EA2. e. Collaboration with SWIFT (BE) concerning the use of the Efficient methodology for the transformation of a transaction for their “standards” department. f. Tutorial "B2B Services: Support to their design and validation" given at the university of Porto by Eric Dubois in January 2008 Contributions to Conferences: - Presentation at the NOE-INTEROP workshop, Geneva, February 2006. - Presentation at the NOE-INTEROP workshop, Amsterdam, February 2006. - Presentation at the Busital’06 workshop during the CAiSE’06 conference - Tutorial “An integrated methodology for the development of complex B2B transactions” at ASE 2006 - Tutorial “An integrated methodology and supporting toolset for the analysis, design and validation of complex B2B transactions” at CAiSE’06 - Tutorial “Enabling electronic business collaboration: from supply chain models towards transaction development” at CEC’06

Refereed Scientific Publications:
  • Rik Eshuis, Pierre Brimont, Eric Dubois, Bertrand Grégoire, Sophie Ramel. EFFICIENT: A Tool Set for Supporting the Modelling and Validation of ebXML Transactions. In P. Inverardi, editor, Proc. of the joint 9th European Software Engineering Conference (ESEC) & 11th SIGSOFT Symposium on the Foundations of Software Engineering (FSE-11), pages 359-362, ACM Press, 2003. (c) ACM. Poster.
  • Rik Eshuis, Pierre Brimont, Eric Dubois, Bertrand Grégoire, Sophie Ramel. Animating ebXML Transactions with a Workflow Engine, In Robert Meersman, Zahir Tari, Douglas Schmidt et al., editors, Proc. CoopIS 2003, volume 2888 of Lecture Notes in Computer Science, Springer, 2003. (c) Springer.
  • Bertrand Grégoire, Sophie Ramel, Michael Schmitt, Pierre Brimont, Eric Dubois. Efficient: atelier de prototypage de transactions d'e-commerce. Workshop ECI 2004, INSA, Lyon.
  • Christophe Incoul, Bertrand Grégoire, Sophie Ramel, Michael Schmitt, Pierre Brimont, Eric Dubois. Efficient: A Framework for Animating and Validating e-Business Transactions. ERCIM News No. 57, April 2004
  • Michael Schmitt, Bertrand Grégoire, Sophie Ramel, Christophe Incoul, Pierre Brimont, Eric Dubois. If business models could speak! Efficient: a framework for appraisal, design and simulation of electronic business transactions . International Conference on Enterprise Integration and Modelling Technology (ICEIMT'04), Toronto, October 2004.
  • Bertrand Grégoire, Michael Schmitt. Efficient: Toolset for the design and validation of B2B transactions. First International workshop on UN/CEFACT Modeling Methodology, Stockholm, March 2005.
  • Amel Mammar, Sophie Ramel, Bertrand Grégoire, Michael Schmitt, Nicolas Guelfi. Efficient: A Toolset for Building Trusted B2B Transactions. 17th Conference on Advanced Information Systems Engineering (CAISE'05), Porto, June 2005.
  • Michael Schmitt, Bertrand Grégoire, Eric Dubois. A risk based guide to business process design in inter-organizational business collaboration. International Workshop on Requirements Engineering for Business Need and IT Alignment (REBNITA 2005), Paris, August 2005.
  • Maria Bergholtz, Bertrand Grégoire, Paul Johannesson, Michael Schmitt, Petia Wohed and Jelena Zdravkovic. Integrated Methodology for linking business and process models with risk mitigation. International Workshop on Requirements Engineering for Business Need and IT Alignment (REBNITA 2005), Paris, August 2005.
  • Michael Schmitt, Christophe Incoul, Eric Dubois. Supporting business experts in the design of b2b transactions through interactive process simulation. International Workshop on Enterprise and Networked Enterprises Interoperability (ENEI'2005), Nancy, September 2005.
  • Christophe Incoul, Michael Schmitt, Patrick Blandin, Eric Dubois. Designing sound e-Government Services by modelling & interactive process animation, International Conference on e-Commerce (IADIS’05), Porto, Portugal, 15th-17th December 2005.
  • N. Guelfi, A. Mammar, A :Formal Semantics of Timed Activity Diagrams and its PROMELA Translation, APSEC'2005: Asia Pacific Software Engineering Conference, Taipei, Taiwan, IEEE Computer Society Press, 2005.
  • Schmitt, M., Gregoire, B., Leidner, S.: Enhancing trust and buy-in from business: a platform for business -driven development of B2B transactions, 18th Conference on Advanced Information Systems Engineering, CAISE 06, Luxembourg, June 2006.
  • Birger Andersson, Maria Bergholtz, Bertrand Grégoire, Paul Johannesson, Michael Schmitt, Jelena Zdravkovic: From Business to Process Models – a Chaining Methodology, International workshop on business/IT alignment and interoperability, BUSITAL 06, Luxembourg, June 2006.
  • Schmitt, M., Gregoire, B. : Business service network design: from business model to an integrated multi-partner business transaction, 2nd International Workshop on Service oriented Solutions for Cooperative Organizations (SoS4CO '06), at the CEC 06, San Francisco, June 2006.
Other Publications:
  • Christophe Incoul, Bertrand Grégoire, Sophie Ramel, Michael Schmitt, Pierre Brimont, Eric Dubois. Efficient: A Framework for Animating and Validating e-Business Transactions. ERCIM News No. 57, April 2004
  • Bertrand Grégoire, Sophie Ramel, Michael Schmitt, Pierre Brimont, Eric Dubois. Efficient: atelier de prototypage de transactions d'e-commerce. Workshop ECI 2004, INSA, Lyon.Press article on Efficient, Vers une nouvelle génération de la messagerie électronique pour le secteur financier, Paperjam, Januar 24th, 2005.
  • Bertrand Grégoire, Michael Schmitt. Efficient: Toolset for the design and validation of B2B transactions. First International workshop on UN/CEFACT Modeling Methodology, Stockholm, March 2005.Press article on Efficient, Le Pragmatisme chercheur, d'Lëtzebuerger Land, 30/09/05

Figure 1: A business-oriented method for refining a business idea into a feasible commercial trransaction.

Figure 2 : Screenshot of the web client for the animator tool, providing forms for filling business messages