How Imixs-Workflow Works

Imixs-Workflow is an open source workflow engine optimized for a human-centric business process management. It follows these goals:

  • control a business process and distribute tasks within an organization based on BPMN 2.0.
  • ensure that all tasks are processed in accordance to compliance guidelines and business rules.
  • securely store business data and protect it from unauthorized access.

In this way Imixs-Workflow improves your business processes and supports human skills and activities in a task oriented and event driven way.

BPMN 2.0

In Imixs-Workflow you can design and execute your business process with the help of the BPMN 2.0 modeling standard. BPMN 2.0 makes it easy to change your business logic without changing one single line of code.

You will learn to design your own business process in the section “How to Model with Imixs-BPMN”. To install Imixs-BPMN see the installation guide.

How to Integrate

The Imixs-Workflow engine can be integrated in different ways:

  • start the Imixs Process Manager within seconds with the help of Docker
  • embed Imixs-Workflow into your Jakarta EE Application and extend it by the microkernel architecture.
  • or you can run Imixs-Workflow as a Microservice and interact with the engine through the Imixs-Rest API.

Imixs-Workflow in the Embedded Mode

Imixs-Workflow is build on the Jakarta EE standard. Within this standard business applications can be developed on a highly scalable and transactional framework. Take a look into the Quickstart Guide to learn how the Imixs-Workflow engine works in your own business application. With the Imixs-Workflow Plugin API you can extend the behavior of Imixs-Workflow.

On Github you will find an JSF Example application which can be used as a starting point. See also the Deployment Guide for information how to deploy the Imixs-Workflow engine on an application server.

Imixs-Workflow as Part of a Microservice Architecture

Imixs-Workflow provides a Rest Service API and can be run as a service in a microservice architecture. In this architectural style the workflow engine can be bound to any existing business application, independent from the technology behind. Business logic can be changed without changing a single line of code.

You can start with the Imixs-Microservice Project which is available on Github. You can use the code as a template for your own microservice.

The Imixs-Workflow project also supports the use of Docker. With this technology you can start an Imixs-Workflow instance with one single command in a container. Learn more about how to containerize Imixs-Workflow in the section Docker. See also the Imixs-Microservice project on Github which provides full Docker support.

What’s Next…

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Need Help?

If you have any questions about the Imixs-Workflow project or how you can best integrate Imixs-Workflow in your own project, join the Imixs Community.