In modern business scenarios, more and more organisations have to deal with the critical requirements of trustworthiness and flexibility, when collaborating in multi-party business processes. This ...calls for new kinds of systems able to manage collaborative processes in untrusted and dynamic environments. Concerning the collaborative perspective, the Business Process Management discipline has provided effective and standardised solutions for a long time, now. Regarding the trustworthiness perspective, blockchain is advocated as one of the most prominent technologies to guarantee trust in a multi-party setting. However, while the immutability of blockchain provides transparent and secure proof of past business interactions, it hinders the flexibility of the business process execution, as the business logic regulating the process execution is immutably stored in the blockchain. On the other hand, flexibility is a property that is becoming crucial in such a setting due to the high dynamism of the business scenarios. In fact, it permits to modify a process at run-time to deal with internal or external changes. In this paper, we face this issue by proposing an architecture for the flexible blockchain-based execution of multi-party business processes. In our approach, business processes are modelled by BPMN choreography diagrams translated into code, whose execution state is then stored in the blockchain. Flexibility is achieved by decoupling the business process’s logic from its execution state, thus allowing run-time changes to the process execution without losing the fundamental properties of trust provided by the blockchain. To show the effectiveness of our approach, we provide a prototypical implementation, called FlexChain, and we use it on a case study from the healthcare application domain. The results obtained by the analysis of cost for the reported case study show the feasibility of the approach. In particular, major costs to sustain relate to one-time operations, such as the deployment and the run-time update of the model, while the most frequent actions are quite efficient.
•A flexible execution of multi-party business processes on blockchain.•Flexibility is supported by an architecture based on off- and on-chain components.•The prototype implementation relies on the Ethereum blockchain and on Drools engine.
Building Information Modeling (BIM) is a widely established method in the architecture, engineering, construction, and facilities management (AEC/FM) industry. Although BIM focuses on processes ...throughout the lifecycle of the built environment, the applications in the planning phase, e.g. the generation of construction site layouts, have not reached their full potential yet. One important example herein is the allocation and dimensioning of resources (e.g., building materials and equipment) which is typically carried out by humans according to clearly defined rules and best practices. This paper presents model-based rule checking for the planning of construction site layouts. We demonstrate that existing Business Rule Management Systems (BRMS), such as the open-source rule engine Drools, can be used. We combine Drools with the Industry Foundation Classes (IFC) to retrieve data from a building information model and use the information within the rule engine. We define general model requirements and implement a sample set of prototype rules. We also introduce the concept of offset geometry for rules that, for example, demand a known safety distance between temporary construction site elements. The developed approaches are explained and evaluated in field-realistic, practical case studies. Finally, we present a discussion how the application of the developed rule-based system may assist human decision making in tasks such as safe construction sites layout planning.
•BIM methods currently do not include tools for construction site layout planning.•A background review presents existing manual techniques and their shortcomings.•The process of digitalizing the construction site layout planning process is explained.•Applications of rule checking in planning temporary construction objects are shown.•An outlook presents strategies for implementation in construction projects.
In the banking industry, data accuracy and integrity are paramount for ensuring regulatory compliance, operational efficiency, and risk management. However, manual data validation processes often ...lead to delays, errors, and inefficiencies, posing challenges for financial institutions. To address these issues, many banks are turning to automation to streamline data validation processes and improve accuracy. Using data automation, banks optimize time-consuming manual tasks such as data entry, validation, and retrieval by creating automated software processes that execute these tasks quickly and accurately. This case study examines how a hypothetical bank uses automation to improve data validation processes, focusing on Albanian Identity Numbers (AINs). By automating validation tasks, the bank enhances accuracy, compliance, and efficiency, mitigating the limitations of manual processes. The study outlines the implementation steps, discusses results, and highlights the importance of automating data validation in the banking sector.
Considering that the largest part of end-use energy consumption worldwide is associated with the buildings sector, there is an inherent need for the conceptualization, specification, implementation, ...and instantiation of novel solutions in smart buildings, able to achieve significant reductions in energy consumption through the adoption of energy efficient techniques and the active engagement of the occupants. Towards the design of such solutions, the identification of the main energy consuming factors, trends, and patterns, along with the appropriate modeling and understanding of the occupants' behavior and the potential for the adoption of environmentally-friendly lifestyle changes have to be realized. In the current article, an innovative energy-aware information technology (IT) ecosystem is presented, aiming to support the design and development of novel personalized energy management and awareness services that can lead to occupants' behavioral change towards actions that can have a positive impact on energy efficiency. Novel information and communication technologies (ICT) are exploited towards this direction, related mainly to the evolution of the Internet of Things (IoT), data modeling, management and fusion, big data analytics, and personalized recommendation mechanisms. The combination of such technologies has resulted in an open and extensible architectural approach able to exploit in a homogeneous, efficient and scalable way the vast amount of energy, environmental, and behavioral data collected in energy efficiency campaigns and lead to the design of energy management and awareness services targeted to the occupants' lifestyles. The overall layered architectural approach is detailed, including design and instantiation aspects based on the selection of set of available technologies and tools. Initial results from the usage of the proposed energy aware IT ecosystem in a pilot site at the University of Murcia are presented along with a set of identified open issues for future research.
A major concern in many electrical drives is the reliability of sensors and
actuators. In the paper, the usage of the Drools expert system (ES) for
Fault detection and isolation (FDI) of the additive ...actuator and sensor DC
Motor faults using the Structured residuals design technique (SRDT) is
presented. The SRDT is used to obtain essential knowledge about the system.
Afterward, an expert system that can isolate faults based on the developed
structure matrix and generated residuals is designed. Accordingly, following
the structure matrix each residual becomes able to answer to a desired
subset of faults and stands insensitive to the others. The proposed method
is successfully applied in an analyzed laboratory system and can be used for
online FDI.
•Help CDSS designers to determine the most suitable rule-based technology for modelling knowledge from CGs.•Identification of main requirements for computable CG extracted from the literature and ...analysis of antibiotic CGs.•Proposal of a novel framework of criteria leading to an effective computable knowledge representation for CGs.•Case study of the John Hopkins Hospital Antibiotic Guidelines for Urinary Tract Infection confirming relevance of criteria.•Determination of the compliance of the different rule technologies with the proposed framework of criteria.
The over-use of antibiotics in clinical domains is causing an alarming increase in bacterial resistance, thus endangering their effectiveness as regards the treatment of highly recurring severe infectious diseases. Whilst Clinical Guidelines (CGs) focus on the correct prescription of antibiotics in a narrative form, Clinical Decision Support Systems (CDSS) operationalize the knowledge contained in CGs in the form of rules at the point of care. Despite the efforts made to computerize CGs, there is still a gap between CGs and the myriad of rule technologies (based on different logic formalisms) that are available to implement CDSSs in real clinical settings.
To helpCDSS designers to determine the most suitable rule-based technology (medical-oriented rules, production rules and semantic web rules) with which to model knowledge from CGs for the prescription of antibiotics. We propose a framework of criteria for this purpose that is extensible to more generic CGs.
Our proposal is based on the identification of core technical requirements extracted from both literature and the analysis of CGs for antibiotics, establishing three dimensions for analysis: language expressivity, interoperability and industrial aspects. We present a case study regarding the John Hopkins Hospital (JHH) Antibiotic Guidelines for Urinary Tract Infection (UTI), a highly recurring hospital acquired infection. We have adopted our framework of criteria in order to analyse and implement these CGs using various rule technologies: HL7 Arden Syntax, general-purpose Production Rules System (Drools), HL7 standard Rule Interchange Format (RIF), Semantic Web Rule Language (SWRL) and SParql Inference Notation (SPIN) rule extensions (implementing our own ontology for UTI).
We have identified the main criteria required to attain a maintainable and cost-affordable computable knowledge representation for CGs. We have represented the JHH UTI CGs knowledge in a total of 12 Arden Syntax MLMs, 81 Drools rules and 154 ontology classes, properties and individuals. Our experiments confirm the relevance of the proposed set of criteria and show the level of compliance of the different rule technologies with the JHH UTI CGs knowledge representation.
The proposed framework of criteria may help clinical institutions to select the most suitable rule technology for the representation of CGs in general, and for the antibiotic prescription domain in particular, depicting the main aspects that lead to Computer Interpretable Guidelines (CIGs), such as Logic expressivity (Open/Closed World Assumption, Negation-As-Failure), Temporal Reasoning and Interoperability with existing HIS and clinical workflow. Future work will focus on providing clinicians with suggestions regarding new potential steps for CGs, considering process mining approaches and CGs Process Workflows, the use of HL7 FHIR for HIS interoperability and the representation of Knowledge-as- a-Service (KaaS).
Safety checklist is a type of cognitive tool enforcing short term memory of medical workers with the purpose of reducing medical errors caused by overlook and ignorance. To facilitate the daily use ...of safety checklists, computerized systems embedded in the clinical workflow and adapted to patient-context are increasingly developed. However, the current hard-coded approach of implementing checklists in these systems increase the cognitive efforts of clinical experts and coding efforts for informaticists. This is due to the lack of a formal representation format that is both understandable by clinical experts and executable by computer programs.
We developed a dynamic checklist meta-model with a three-step approach. Dynamic checklist modeling requirements were extracted by performing a domain analysis. Then, existing modeling approaches and tools were investigated with the purpose of reusing these languages. Finally, the meta-model was developed by eliciting domain concepts and their hierarchies. The feasibility of using the meta-model was validated by two case studies. The meta-model was mapped to specific modeling languages according to the requirements of hospitals.
Using the proposed meta-model, a comprehensive coronary artery bypass graft peri-operative checklist set and a percutaneous coronary intervention peri-operative checklist set have been developed in a Dutch hospital and a Chinese hospital, respectively. The result shows that it is feasible to use the meta-model to facilitate the modeling and execution of dynamic checklists.
We proposed a novel meta-model for the dynamic checklist with the purpose of facilitating creating dynamic checklists. The meta-model is a framework of reusing existing modeling languages and tools to model dynamic checklists. The feasibility of using the meta-model is validated by implementing a use case in the system.
In an interconnected world, cyber and physical networks face a number of challenges that need to be resolved. These challenges are mainly due to the nature and complexity of interconnected systems ...and networks and their ability to support heterogeneous physical and cyber components simultaneously. The construction of complex networks preserving Security and Dependability (S&D) properties is necessary to avoid system vulnerabilities, which may occur in all the different layers of Software Defined Networking (SDN) architectures. In this paper, we present a model based approach to support the design of secure and dependable SDN. This approach is based on executable patterns for designing networks able to guarantee S&D properties and can be used in SDN networks. The design patterns express conditions that can guarantee specific S&D properties and can be used to design networks that have these properties and manage them during their deployment. To evaluate our pattern approach, we have implemented executable pattern instances, in a rule-based reasoning system, and used them to design and verify wireless SDN networks with respect to availability and confidentiality. To complete this work, we propose and evaluate an implementation framework in which S&D patterns can be applied for the design and verification of SDN networks.
PurposeErythemato-squamous disease (ESD) is one of the complex diseases related to the dermatology field. Due to common morphological features, the diagnosis of ESDs become stringent and leads to ...inconsistency. Besides, diagnosis has been done on the basis of inculcated visible symptoms pertinent with the expertise of the physician. Hence, ontology construction for ESD is essential to ensure credibility, consistency, to resolve lack of time, labor and competence and to diminish human error.Design/methodology/approachThis paper presents the design of an automatic ontology framework through data mining techniques and subsequently depicts the diagnosis of ESD using the available knowledge- and rule-based system.FindingsThe rule language (Semantic Web Rule Language) and rule engine (Jess and Drools) have been integrated to explore the severity of the ESD and foresee the most appropriate class to be suggested.Social implicationsIn this paper, the authors identify the efficiency of the rule engine and investigate the performance of the computational techniques in predicting ESD using three different measures.Originality/valuePrimarily, the approach assesses transfer time for total number of axioms exported to rule engine (Jess and Drools) while the other approach measures the number of inferred axioms (process time) using the rule engine while the third measure calculates the time to translate the inferred axioms to OWL knowledge (execution time).
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