Appendix B — Glossary
This appendix explains the technical terms used throughout the book.
- ADR (Architecture Decision Record)
- Lightweight documentation format for recording architectural decisions in a structured way — context, decision, and rationale.
- BPA (Business Process Automation)
- The use of technology to automate the execution of business processes.
- BPMN (Business Process Model and Notation)
- A standard of the Object Management Group (OMG) for graphical modelling of business processes. Current version: 2.0.2 (Object Management Group 2014).
- BPMS (Business Process Management System)
- A platform for modelling, executing, monitoring, and optimising business processes. The BPA Lab uses Camunda 8.
- Camunda 8
- A cloud-native BPMS built around the Zeebe workflow engine. The BPA Lab uses the self-managed variant (Camunda Services GmbH 2026).
- Controller
- In the BPA Lab, a software component that directly controls hardware (Fischertechnik components, IoT devices). Predominantly implemented in Python.
- C4 model
- A notation for visualising software architecture at four levels of abstraction: Context, Container, Component, Code. Introduced by Simon Brown — https://c4model.com/ (Brown 2018).
- DDD (Domain-Driven Design)
- An approach to software development that places the business domain at the centre. The guiding principle for the modular decomposition of the BPA Lab (Evans 2003).
- DMN (Decision Model and Notation)
- An OMG standard for modelling business decisions (Object Management Group 2024). Supported in Camunda 8 as a complement to BPMN.
- End-to-end process
- A business process viewed from its triggering event through to its final business outcome — in the BPA Lab, from the arrival of a customer order to the delivery of a bicycle.
- Fischertechnik Industry 4.0 factory
- A modular model of an Industry-4.0 factory by Fischertechnik. In the BPA Lab, it serves as the physical demonstration system.
- gRPC
- A high-performance Remote Procedure Call framework originated at Google. In the BPA Lab, Camunda 8 uses gRPC to communicate with job workers.
- Happy path
- The path through a process in which no errors, exceptions, or edge cases occur.
- IoT (Internet of Things)
- The networking of physical devices with the internet and with each other.
- Job worker
- In Camunda 8, an external application that picks up service tasks from the workflow and executes them. In the BPA Lab, job workers are implemented in Java.
- MQTT (Message Queuing Telemetry Transport)
- A lightweight publish-subscribe protocol widely used in the IoT space. In the BPA Lab, MQTT is the communication protocol between job workers and controllers.
- Openrouteservice
- A public API for routing and distance calculation based on OpenStreetMap data. Used in the BPA Lab’s shipment process.
- Process mining
- Data-driven analysis of business processes based on event logs from information systems. A central teaching and demonstration component in the BPA Lab (Aalst 2016).
- Process application
- In the BPA Lab, a logical grouping of job workers and process models belonging to one business domain (e.g. Order Management).
- Production order
- An order to manufacture a specific product. In the BPA Lab, one production order is created per product line in a customer order.
- RPA (Robotic Process Automation)
- A technology to automate manual, repetitive tasks in existing applications via their user interface.
- Workflow engine
- A software component that executes process models (e.g. expressed in BPMN), manages the state of process instances, and distributes work to humans or job workers.
- XES (eXtensible Event Stream)
- An IEEE standard for event logs in process mining — a format for the exchange of process event data between systems.