Process Interchange Format
Process Interchange Format (PIF)
Introduction
Critical in Business Process Reengineering or Enterprise Integration
is the ability to share and interlink heterogeneous process models.
The goal of the PIF (Process Interchange Format) project is to support
the exchange of business process models across different formats and
schemas. The project pursues this goal by developing PIF (a common
translation language that serves as a bridge among heterogeneous
process representations), local translators between PIF and local
process representations, and a mechanism for extending PIF to
accommodate different expressive needs in a modular way (Partially
Shared View).
The PIF project aims to support translations such that process
descriptions can be automatically translated back and forth between
PIF and other process representations with as little loss of meaning
as possible. If translation cannot be done fully automatically, the
human efforts needed to assist the translation should be minimized.
If a translator cannot translate part of a PIF process description to
its target format, it should:
- Translate as much of the description as possible (and not, for
example, simply issue an error message and give up)
- Represent any untranslatable parts so that the translator can add
them back to the process description when it is translated back into
PIF.
PIF Documents
The PIF Process Interchange and Framework Version 1.1, Jintae Lee
(editor) Micheal Grunninger, Yan Jin, Thomas Malone, Austin Tate, Gregg
Yost and other members of the PIF Working Group, published as MIT Center
for Coordination Science, Working Paper #194, 1996.
PIF Contacts
To contact the PIF Working Group send mail to pif-comments@mit.edu.
The Process Interchange Format Working Group has its main web site at
http://soa.cba.hawaii.edu/pif/.
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