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Declarative process modelling is a constraint-centric approach that treats business rules as first-class citizens in business process models. Augmenting the declarative process modelling technique with capability to detect the constraint violations during business process execution is of crucial importance. The purpose of this paper is to contribute to the modelling of business rules through a repository of pattern-oriented templates.

The semantics of the business rule templates is underpinned by linear temporal logic (LTL). Automated temporal reasoning is then conducted for determining whether process executions adhere to the business rules through the utilisation of the Logics Workbench (LWB). An application of the methodological framework is illustrated by a realistic case study on degree requirements verification.

To access the practicality of the approach, the case study of this paper is based on the verification of degree requirements, which is different from the domain area of the case study in the author’s prior work. The findings indicated that the temporal framework could be applied to the declarative process modelling in a consistent and efficient manner.

This paper is an extended version of the author’s earlier study. More details on the LTL and LWB are provided in the current study. The author introduces 17 new business rule templates and illustrates the utilisation of the new templates via a case study that belongs to a different domain area.

An integral part of declarative process modelling is to guarantee that the execution of a declarative workflow is compliant with the respective business rules. The purpose of this paper is to establish a formal framework for representing business rules and determining whether any business rules are violated during the executions of declarative process models.

In the approach, a business rule is phrased in terms of restricted English that is related to a constraint template. Linear temporal logic (LTL) is employed as a formalism for defining the set of constraint templates. By exploiting the theorem-proving feature of the Logics Workbench (LWB), business rule violations are then detected in an automatic manner.

This study explored the viability of encoding: first, process executions by means of LTL and second, business rules in terms of restricted English that built upon pattern-oriented templates and LTL. The LWB was used for carrying out temporal reasoning through automated techniques. The applicability of the formal verification approach was exemplified by a case study concerning supply chain management. The findings showed that practical reasoning could be achieved by combining declarative process modelling, restricted English, pattern-oriented templates, LTL and LWB.

First, new business rule templates are proposed; second, business rules are expressed in restricted English instead of graphical constructs; third, both finite execution trace and business rules are grounded in LTL. There is no need to deal with the semantic differences between different formalisms; and finally, the theorem prover LWB is used for the conformance checking of a finite execution trace against business rules.

The purpose of this paper is to focus on the reference model of a grid-like supply network that enables formulation of delivery routing and scheduling problems in the context of the periodic vehicle routing problem.

The conditions for seamless (collision-free) synchronization of periodically executed local transport processes presented in this paper guarantee cyclic execution of supply processes, thereby preventing traffic flow congestion.

Systems that satisfy this characteristic, cyclic deliveries executed along supply chains are given and what is sought is the number of vehicles needed to operate the local transport processes in order to ensure delivery from and to specific loading/unloading points on given dates. Determination of sufficient conditions guaranteeing the existence of feasible solutions that satisfy these constraints makes it possible to solve the considered class of problems online.

The computer experiments reported in this paper show the possibilities of practical application of the proposed approach in the construction of decision support systems for food supply chain management.

The aim of the present work is to develop a methodology for the synthesis of regularly structured supply networks that would ensure fixed cyclic execution of local transport processes. The proposed methodology, which implements sufficient conditions for the synchronization of local cyclic processes, allows one to develop a method for rapid prototyping of supply processes that satisfies the time windows constraints given.

Process modeling guidelines are a valuable instrument for increasing the quality of process models. Since finding and selecting suitable guidelines are challenging, this paper aims to find and select suitable guidelines because they are scattered across the many studies of the literature. Also, not all of them are supported by empirical studies.

The authors conducted a systematic literature review to collect and analyze process modeling guidelines present in the literature and the empirical evidence that supports them.

The authors investigated a total of 793 articles and identified a total of 45 process modeling guidelines in five different categories. For each of these guidelines, the authors report empirical evidence together with corresponding measures, such as comprehension accuracy and error probability.

Compared to the prior literature reviews on process model quality and process modeling guidelines, this article extends current knowledge by analyzing the empirical evidence and variables associated with each guideline. This analysis provides guidance for practitioners and scholars on which guidelines to use while modeling a process and perform further research on.

Medical diagnosis and treatment processes exhibit a high degree of variability, as during the process execution, healthcare professionals can decide on additional steps, change the execution order or skip a task. Process models can help to document and to discuss such processes. However, depicting variability in graphical process models using standardized languages, such as Business Process Model and Notation (BPMN), can lead to large and complicated diagrams that medical staff who do not have formal training in modeling languages have difficulty understanding. This study proposes a pattern-based process visualization that medical doctors can understand without extensive training. The process descriptions using this pattern-based visualization can later be transformed into formal business process models in languages such as BPMN.

The authors derived patterns for expressing variability in healthcare processes from the literature and medical guidelines. Then, the authors evaluated and revised these patterns based on interviews with physicians in a Danish hospital.

A set of business process variability patterns was proposed to express situations with variability in hospital treatment and diagnosis processes. The interviewed medical doctors could translate the patterns into their daily work practice, and the patterns were used to model a hospital process.

When communicating with medical personnel, the patterns can be used as building blocks for documenting and discussing variable processes.

The patterns can reduce complexity in process visualization. This study provides the first validation of these patterns in a hospital.

This paper aims to examine factors that influence repeat visits to non‐transactional web sites. Drawing on repurchase and continuance research, this study identifies four focal constructs: site commitment, satisfaction, social influences, and medium involvement, and clarifies the mediator versus moderator role of site commitment.

Actual visitors to five B2B and B2C non‐transactional web sites provide data participated in an online survey. The tests use the combined sample and then verify results for the individual sites. The test for mediation relies on structural path analysis; the test for moderation uses moderated regression analysis.

The four focal constructs influence web site revisitation, though in most settings, only site commitment has a direct effect. Findings support the mediator role of site commitment, though some sites exhibit only partial mediation. Results are consistent across B2C and B2B contexts. The relative impact of social influences and medium involvement is less certain, and their impact varies across individual sites.

Because this study uses non‐probability sampling to gather respondents, they may not represent all types of visitors to the sites. The non‐transactional sites are primarily information sites, which restricts the findings. Research that considers other types of non‐transactional sites, such as entertainment or global sites, could offer further insights, especially with regard to the impact of cultural differences.

This research clarifies the role of site commitment by testing for mediation and moderation within the one study.

Complex system modeling requires not only understanding of modeling framework but also domain knowledge of the system. The purpose of this paper is to present an approach which separates the domain knowledge from the modeling framework with different views.

By establishing the mechanism of association and fusion among the views, the description and characterization of system from different aspect and point of view can form a complete system model. Based on the approach, a modeling and simulation (M&S) platform named SimFaster is developed. Modeling environment and simulation engine are the most important parts of the platform. The modeling environment provides multi‐views and multi‐layers to help the developers to modeling the structure, layers, composition, behavior, and interactions of an application system. The simulation engine provides mechanism of integration and interaction for components and objects, and provides runtime support for the concepts and terms from modeling environment. The simulation engine organizes the objects in the memory of distributed system as reflective object database system, so it is repository centered architecturally.

Based on the approach of multi‐views modeling, the platform is a flexible framework and supports top‐down design, model reuse and interoperation, dynamic refinement of models, corporative design among different users in different stages, and the rebuilt of application rapidly.

This paper deals with high‐level models of the complex systems.

This platform helps to design, modeling, and simulation complex system (especially for weapon combat system). It can participate into all the stages of the development of complex product/system, and can support the validation, refinement, optimization of models, and systems.

This paper presents a multi‐views modeling approach for the modeling of complex system.

This paper aims to present a tool-supported approach for visualising personas as social goal models, which can subsequently be used to identify security tensions.

The authors devised an approach to partially automate the construction of social goal models from personas. The authors provide two examples of how this approach can identify previously hidden implicit vulnerabilities and validate ethical hazards faced by penetration testers and their safeguards.

Visualising personas as goal models makes it easier for stakeholders to see implications of their goals being satisfied or denied and designers to incorporate the creation and analysis of such models into the broader requirements engineering (RE) tool-chain.

The approach can be used with minimal changes to existing user experience and goal modelling approaches and security RE tools.

Organizational Development and Change (ODC) has been called to aid organizational greening goals. Carbon labeling of products by organizations is a common greening strategy. However, its effectiveness is dependent on supportive consumer behavior. The Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) is used to explain actor choice in buying low carbon products (LCPs). Actual buying behavior of 873 subjects in China, a country new to carbon labeling, demonstrated that Declarative norms, Attitude, and Perceived behavioral control explained significant variance in actual buying behavior of LCPs. The TPB model may be better served by observing actual behavior versus behavioral intention. Revisions to the TPB model for diagnosis and interventions in behavioral change are indicated. ODC should revert to theoretically informed practice versus the increasing reliance on A-theoretical tools and techniques.

This paper aims to analyze how decision support systems manage Big data to obtain value.

A systematic literature review was performed with screening and analysis of 72 articles published between 2012 and 2019.

The findings reveal that techniques of big data analytics, machine learning algorithms and technologies predominantly related to computer science and cloud computing are used on decision support systems. Another finding was that the main areas that these techniques and technologies are been applied are logistic, traffic, health, business and market. This article also allows authors to understand the relationship in which descriptive, predictive and prescriptive analyses are used according to an inverse relationship of complexity in data analysis and the need for human decision-making.

As it is an emerging theme, this study seeks to present an overview of the techniques and technologies that are being discussed in the literature to solve problems in their respective areas, as a form of theoretical contribution. The authors also understand that there is a practical contribution to the maturity of the discussion and with reflections even presented as suggestions for future research, such as the ethical discussion. This study’s descriptive classification can also serve as a guide for new researchers who seek to understand the research involving decision support systems and big data to gain value in our society.