An XML‐based process repository and process query language for integrated process management

Despite surging interests in business processes that must be managed throughout their lifecycle, there have been very few research efforts that have focused on a process repositories that support reuse of business processes and the knowledge discovery that may result from. This paper introduces an XML-based process repository and process query language for Integrated Process Management (IPM), which has been proposed to support the management of business processes throughout their lifecycle. The paper identifies comprehensive requirements for a process repository including a new notion of process state management and proposes an architecture that satisfies these requirements. Then, it presents IPM-PQL, an XML-based process query language for IPM, which reflects various process search requirements. This paper also presents a prototype system to demonstrate that the architecture and query language can support effective retrieval of process-related information to support the management of business processes. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.