07/22/08 :: [SOA] Physhun: State Models in Java [permalink]
Justin McCarter and Jim Ladd have published a summary of Physhun:
a Spring-based framework for implementing complex processes through Finite State Machine models
I am a bit disappointed at the metamodel they chose but that's a start. I personally see actions as pre-actions and post-action (as you enter and leave a state), I also think they could use a more precise definition for an event: an event is the occurrence of a state. An event can be communicated with a message, this message can be called a message event. They use event messages to trigger transitions. Ultimately there will be a need to mesh more complex interaction patterns with the state machine.
The part that turned me off a bit is the association between process and state machine. Obviously they have not read my article on the topic. Note that they are not too far from it, they seem to be calling an "object lifecycle" a "process", but rightfully their approach makes a business object inherit from a "process" object.
Physhun supports trans-actions and persistence.
Frankly if every enterprise developer could understand this concept we could shed tens of billions of dollars (globally) in inefficient code being written specifically to manage (and maintain) the lifecycle of the business objects. Even outside the context of SOA.