van-der-aalst-2003-workflow-patterns

What problem does it solve?

Provides a practical, research-backed method to identify, evaluate, and remediate coordination expressiveness gaps in orchestration systems by mapping real workflows to the canonical workflow patterns taxonomy.

Core Features & Use Cases

• Pattern Mapping & Selection: Identify which control-flow patterns (sequence, AND/XOR/OR splits, discriminator, synchronizing merge, N-out-of-M, arbitrary cycles, deferred choice, cancellation regions, milestones) a workflow requires.
• System Evaluation & Gap Analysis: Diagnose whether an orchestrator (DAG engines, state machines, Petri-net based systems) natively supports each pattern, requires workarounds, or cannot support it reliably.
• Failure Mode Diagnosis & Remediation: Provide targeted fixes for common failures (race conditions, deadlocks, orphaned handlers, incorrect merges) and recommend architectural remedies (event-driven deferred choice, atomic discriminators, external orchestrators, encapsulation strategies).
• Use Cases: Multi-agent competitive evaluation (first-past-the-post), dynamic data pipelines (OR-split + synchronizing merge), iterative refinement loops (arbitrary cycles), and human-in-the-loop deferred choices.

Quick Start

Map your orchestration flow to the pattern taxonomy, run the pattern-composition tests to reveal expressiveness gaps, and produce a prioritized remediation plan.