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1. Digital Libraries and the business process: reflections on a theme Dr Liz Lyon, Director UKOLN, University of Bath, UK BL/JISC/UKOLN Workshop, British Library March 2006. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons LicenceAttribution-ShareAlike 2.0 UKOLN is supported by: www.bath.ac.uk www.ukoln.ac.uk a centre of expertise in digital information management

2. Overview • Mapping the business process: the intricate mix of humans and machines • Some thoughts about workflow • Social networks and service development • Summary: take home message British Library / JISC / UKOLN Workshop

3. What do we mean by “business process”??? British Library / JISC / UKOLN Workshop

4. “A business process is a collection of related structural activities that produce something of value to the organization, its stake holders or its customers. It is, for example, the process through which an organization realizes its services to its customers”. British Library / JISC / UKOLN Workshop

5. “The linkage of business process with value generation leads some practitioners to view business processes as the workflows which realize an organization's use cases”. …..Workflows??? British Library / JISC / UKOLN Workshop

6. “Workflow at its simplest is the movement of documents and/or tasks through a work process. More specifically, workflow is the operational aspect of a work procedure: how tasks are structured, who performs them, what their relative order is, how they are synchronized, how information flows to support the tasks and how tasks are being tracked”. British Library / JISC / UKOLN Workshop

7. “Distinction can be made between "scientific" and "business" workflow paradigms. While the former is mostly concerned with throughput of data through various algorithms, applications and services, ….the latter concentrates on scheduling task executions, including dependencies which are not necessarily data-driven and may include human agents”. British Library / JISC / UKOLN Workshop

8. Comparing workflow Tom Oinn 2003 http://twiki.mygrid.org.uk/ British Library / JISC / UKOLN Workshop

9. British Library / JISC / UKOLN Workshop

10. OK - so in the context of our institutions ……(and digital libraries)…..what exactly do we mean by “business process” and “workflow” ??? British Library / JISC / UKOLN Workshop

11. (Very simple) e-Research Cycle (New) knowledge extraction: data mining, modelling, analysis, synthesis Formulate hypothesis / ideas, test, experiment, observe: data creation, collection & capture Data processing Data processing Data processing Data management storage & validation: description, deposit, self-archiving, preservation, certification e-Infrastructure Open access Collaboration Adding value: Data linking, annotation, visualisation, simulation Data processing Data processing Scholarly communications: data disclosure, publication, citation, discovery, re-use This work is licensed under a Creative Commons LicenseAttribution-ShareAlike 2.0 British Library / JISC / UKOLN Workshop

12. Gathering information about (e-)research • Project StORe: Source-to-Output Repositories (Edinburgh) • primary data : research publications • Survey questionnaire • RepoMMan: Repository Metadata and Management (Hull) • Survey questionnaire and interviews • Activity diagram British Library / JISC / UKOLN Workshop

13. JISC Digital Repository Programme DigiRep wiki http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/repositories/digirep/index/JISC_Digital_Repository_Wiki British Library / JISC / UKOLN Workshop

14. Data capture • R4L Repository for the Laboratory Project (JISC-funded) automated data capture from instrumentation, deposit of results (chemistry) at Univ. Southampton • SMART TEA electronic Laboratory notebook + annotations • R4L deposit scenario British Library / JISC / UKOLN Workshop

15. User scenario (…part of….) • Produce strategy for synthesis (=idea) • Submit plan to SmartTea system (incl. identifiers) • Retrieve and follow instructions (sub-workflow?) • Experimental synthesis metadata automatically recorded on instruments (Smart Lab) • Create record for synthesised sample (+ proposed chemical identifier) in R4L laboratory data management system • Run spectral analyses on sample capturing further analysis metadata (incl. time-stamp, analysis software version, researcher details etc.) • Save spectrum in native and common formats • Invoke R4L data capture service and deposit files + metadata in laboratory repository…. British Library / JISC / UKOLN Workshop

16. Services for simple & rapid deposit Data manipulation toolbox Associated Metadata Value added Format conversion British Library / JISC / UKOLN Workshop

17. RAW DATA DERIVED DATA RESULTS DATA Crystallography workflow • Initialisation: mount new sample set up data collection • Collection: collect data • Processing: process and correct images • Solution: solve structures • Refinement: refine structure • CIF: produce CIF (Crystallographic Information File) • Validation: chemical & crystallographic checks • Report: generate Crystal Structure Report British Library / JISC / UKOLN Workshop

18. A data repository entry ecrystals.chem.soton.ac.uk British Library / JISC / UKOLN Workshop

19. Access to the underlying data British Library / JISC / UKOLN Workshop

20. Laboratory Repositories R4L Slide: Simon Coles, Univ. Southampton British Library / JISC / UKOLN Workshop

21. http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/projects/ebank-uk/ eBank UK Project • Aggregator service harvests metadata from institutional repository (e-crystals archive) • eBank service embedded in PSIgate portal for 3rd party search • Service linking from data to derived research publication • Embedding eBank service in learning workflows UKOLN (lead), University of Southampton, University of Manchester British Library / JISC / UKOLN Workshop

22. But….….how should we be “formalising” workflows? British Library / JISC / UKOLN Workshop

23. YAWL METEOR-S BPEL OpenWFE RADRunner BPSS (ebXML) PSL Geo-Opera JDF XLANG Taverna Kepler Pegasus Triana SPA ICENI BioOpera Wildfire BPML WS-CDL Workflow systems & standards Is “workflow standard” an oxymoron? British Library / JISC / UKOLN Workshop

24. Kepler Project http://kepler-project.org/Wiki.jsp?page=KeplerProject British Library / JISC / UKOLN Workshop

25. http://taverna.sourceforge.net/ British Library / JISC / UKOLN Workshop

26. Slide: Carole Goble British Library / JISC / UKOLN Workshop

27. DL workflows : a complex picture • Workflows for data capture, deposit, preservation, citation, discovery, mining &&…. • Multiple workflows interacting together • Workflows may call on each other, in a defined order • Multiple workflows may use “common” services e.g. Assign (identifier) • Require sequential or parallel execution, have dependencies, be time-limited, repetitive • Have an owner (control) • Include essential human interventions • ? ? ? British Library / JISC / UKOLN Workshop

28. Workflow…the answers to Who? What? When? in a business process. A workflow is only as good as the business process beneath it.Margie Virdell,IBM developerWorks British Library / JISC / UKOLN Workshop

29. Some observations…. • We don’t know enough about institutional business process: • Learning & teaching, research, admin, enterprise • How to analyse, express and model processes • What types of models? • At what levels of granularity: strategic (for a manager) vs detailed mathematical specifications (for a developer) • Which workflow tools & standards should we use? • Learn from e-Science projects • Which processes are best driven by machines and which by humans? • How do human-directed processes interact with machine-driven ones? • What are the digital library “touch points” in these processes? British Library / JISC / UKOLN Workshop

30. Service-oriented architectures for Digital Libraries • Produce process models (DLF?) • Experience of VRE projects • Integrative Biology user scenarios • Service typology (e-Framework?) • Identify services: service definitions • Service interactions: service patterns • Orchestration of Web services • Choreography of Web services • Workflow interoperability…. (another oxymoron?) British Library / JISC / UKOLN Workshop

31. “Orchestrating the knitting” “Integration trumps re-invention” “We work in a services ecosystem” “new social models for DLs” “Polygamous recombination” British Library / JISC / UKOLN Workshop

32. Discovering data: • Domain identifier: International Chemical Identifier (INChI) code • Google molecule using INChI • Slide from Simon Coles Coles, S.J., Day, N.E., Murray-Rust, P., Rzepa, H.S., Zhang, Y., Org. Biomol. Chem., 2005, (10),1832-1834. DOI: 10.1039/b502828k British Library / JISC / UKOLN Workshop

33. Avian flu outbreaks mashup - Nature January 2006 British Library / JISC / UKOLN Workshop

34. New prototype services British Library / JISC / UKOLN Workshop

35. British Library / JISC / UKOLN Workshop

36. Take home messages • Need to understand more about institutional business process: cultural heritage, learning & teaching, research, admin, enterprise… • Assessment of the value of workflow studies • Evaluation of workflow systems, tools & standards • How best to analyse, express and model processes • Types of models • At what levels of granularity • Interactions between human-directed processes & machine-driven ones: implications for services • Social development of Digital Library services: creation, interaction, recombination and integration ….an intricate mix of humans & machines British Library / JISC / UKOLN Workshop

37. Thank you. UKOLN receives core funding from the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC) and the Museums, Libraries & Archives Council (MLA) and is based at the University of Bath, UK. More information: UKOLN http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/