WoPeD Workflow Petri Net Designer
Thomas Freytag
University of Cooperative Education (Berufsakademie)
Department of Computer Science
D-76052 Karlsruhe
[email protected]
Abstract. WoPeD (WoPeD Petrinet Designer) is a Java-based software tool being
developed as an open-source project at the University of Cooperative Education
(BA) Karlsruhe, Germany. WoPeD uses the Petri Net Markup Language (PNML)
as interchange format and is able to edit, simulate and analyse workflow Petri
nets (WF-nets) as originally introduced by Wil van der Aalst.
Keywords. Workflow nets, Java, PNML.
1 Quick Overwiew
Name
Homepage
Availability
Platforms
Net class
File format
Features
WoPeD
www.woped.org
Free (open-source)
Independendent (Java)
Installer for Windows, Linux and MacOS
Workflow Nets, Place/Transition Nets
PNML 1.3.2
Graphical editor, simulator, analysing
interface
2 Short description
WoPeD is a simple, easy-to-use, platform-independent software tool for editing, analysing
and visualizing workflow Petri nets. WoPeD is a successor work of the original software
product named PWFtool which has already been presented and published in [FrL03]. WoPeD
is freely available via the project website [WoP05] and runs on all operating systems for
which a Java VM is available, in particular on all Windows 32-bit systems, most Linux
distributions and MacOS X.
WoPeD is mainly a tool for educational and publishing purposes. It aims to support lecturers,
researchers and students in the field of Petri nets and Workflow Management in their daily
work. By relating strictly to the original van der Aalst workflow net notation [Aal98], WoPeD
is a handy tool to create lecture notes, interactive teaching material or example case studies.
WoPeD can visualize the structure and the dynamics of workflow nets and can provide a
deeper understanding of the underlying concepts. WoPeD has even successfully served as a
software front-end for small student assessment projects.
WoPeD offers a comfortable, intuitive modelling interface, a graphical interactive token game
simulator and supports several export interfaces, including JPEG graphics, standard PNML
[WeK03] and TPN. By this, net models created with WoPeD can easily be exported and
furtherly investigated by third-party tools like Woflan [Wof05] or Pipe [Pip05].
3 Functional features
The development of WoPeD started in Mai 2003 as a part of a diploma thesis [Lan03] at the
University of Cooperative Education (BA) Karlsruhe. In the meantime, a growing and very
productive project group has been established, consisting of staff persons and students of the
BA Karlsruhe, but also of former students, neighbour universities and software engineers
from local industry partners. The first public beta was published in March 2005 via
Sourceforge, a well-established development platform for open-source projects. The current
version of WoPeD is mainly implementing an elaborate graphical modelling environment and
supplies the following functional features:
Full graphical editor
WoPeD provides a powerful graphical editor for place/transition nets. A multiple-document
interface allows to work concurrently with several open nets.
Smart editing functions
Many comfortable editing features, e. g. cut, paste and copy functions (also across editor
windows) as well as undo and redo functions (with unlimited history) and group and ungroup
functions to simplify changes. Editor windows can be scaling arbitrarily, allowing to produce
high-quality net graphics. A very useful feature is "smart-naming" allowing on-the-fly net
element name editing and "smart-arc-drawing", allowing to create nets with a minimum of
mouse clicks.
Support for Workflow Nets
WoPeD can handle tradional place/transition nets, but also supports the extended "van der
Aalst"-like workflow net syntax with special split and join transitions (AND, XOR) and four
trigger types (resource, time, message).
Animated token game simulation
The current net can be executed by playing the token game interactively.
PNML-compliant file format
The standard file format of WoPeD is based on the widely-accepted PNML syntax, enabling
to export or import net models to and from other Petri net tools which are using PNML. The
workflow net extensions are transparently translated into plain PNML
Export to multiple formats
WoPeD supports several output formats to use the created models either graphically (JPEG)
or textually (TPN) to perform soundness checks with Woflan. Additionally, a direct call
interface to Woflan is provided.
Fully-integrated user manual
An interactive HTML user manual is included an can be used from inside WoPeD.
4 Screenshots
The following screenshots provide a visual impression of the user interface of WoPeD and are
all based on version 0.8.0 (first public beta release from Mar 25th, 2005).
Graphical editor
Context menu for net elements
Woflan calling interface
Configuration dialog
Interactive token game
Built-in user manual
5 Future plans
WoPeD is a work-in-progress project and is planned to be extended significantly in the near
future.
Subprocesses
It will be possible to split workflow nets into light-weight, handy subprocesses, being able to
handle even large process models. This feature should also allow the embedding of one
subprocess definition in more than one workflow processes, leading to a collection of reusable
process modules.
Workflow patterns
Another challenge will be the support of workflow patterns as discussed in recent publications
and most promisingly implemented in the YAWL project [Yaw05]. By supporting the
underlying pattern concept and interfacing to the YAWL syntax, WoPeD could serve as an
alternative front-end for editing and validating engine-executable workflow processes.
Qualititive analysis
Moreover, WoPeD will be extended to by an analysis engine, being able to perform
soundness checks by using built-in algorithms or by calling additional third-party tools. One
important issue will be the future perspective of PNML and the (hopefully) increasing number
of specialized analysis tools being able to understand this format. WoPeD could be again a
graphical front-end for visualizing analysis results.
Quantitative analysis
Another important future extension of WoPeD is to allow the creation of a separate resource
model in addition to the workflow process definition. By assigning resource classes (i. e.
groups and roles) to workflow tasks and by specifying (estimated) execution times of each
task as well as assigning (estimated) branching probabilities of OR-split transitions, it will be
possible to apply performance measurement methods like those described by van der Aalst
and van Hee in [AaH02]. Implementing the associated algorithm, WoPeD again can act as a
problem solver and visualizing front-end for quantiative analysis results.
6 Conclusion
WoPeD is a evolving tool for many purposes. Though currently mainly useful for teaching
and presentation purposes, it is on its best way to become a powerful modelling and analysis
platform for many workflow-related applications.
7 References
W. M. P. van der Aalst, K. van Hee. Workflow Management Models, Methods
and Systems. MIT Press, Cambridge, 2002.
W. M. P. van der Aalst. The Application of Petri Nets to Workflow Management.
[Aal98]
The Journal of Circuits, Systems and Computers, 8 (1) 1998, pp. 21-66.
T. Freytag. Softwarevalidierung durch Auswertung von Petrinetz-Ablufen. PhD
[Fre01]
thesis, University of Karlsruhe, 2001.
[FrL03] T. Freytag, S. I. Landes. PWFtool a Petri net workflow modelling environment.
Proceedings of the Workshop "Algorithmen und Werkzeuge fr Petrinetze
(AWPN), Eichsttt, 2003.
[Lan03] S. I. Landes. Entwicklung eines Modellierungstools fr Workflow-Petrinetze.
Diploma Thesis BA Karlsruhe, 2003.
The PIPE project homepage. http://petri-net.sf.net, 2005.
[Pip05]
[WeK03] M. Weber, E. Kindler. The Petri Net Markup Language. In: H. Ehrig, W. Reisig,
G. Rozenberg, H. Weger (Eds.). Petri Net Technology for Communication Based
Systems, LNCS 2472, Springer 2003.
H. M. W. Verbeek. Verification of WF-nets. PhD thesis, TU Eindhoven, 2004.
[Ver04]
[Wof05] The Woflan project homepage. http://is.tm.tue.nl/research/woflan, 2005.
[WoP05] The WoPeD project homepage. http:///www.woped.org, 2005.
[Yaw05] The YAWL project homepage. http://www.citi.qut.edu.au/yawl, 2005.
[AaH02]
