A workflow engine is a software application that manages and executes modeled computer processes. It is a key component in workflow technology

Workflow technology

Workflow technology is a new field of software products designed to improve the design of information systems. It involves use of workflow engine to execute models of processes....

 and typically makes use of a database server

Database server

A database server is a computer program that provides database services to other computer programs or computers, as defined by the client–server model. The term may also refer to a computer dedicated to running such a program...

.

A workflow

Workflow

A workflow consists of a sequence of connected steps. It is a depiction of a sequence of operations, declared as work of a person, a group of persons, an organization of staff, or one or more simple or complex mechanisms. Workflow may be seen as any abstraction of real work...

 engine interprets events, such as documents submitted to a server or due dates expiring, and acts on them according to defined computer processes. The actions may be anything from saving the document in a document management system

Document management system

A document management system is a computer system used to track and store electronic documents and/or images of paper documents. It is usually also capable of keeping track of the different versions created by different users . The term has some overlap with the concepts of content management...

 to issuing new work by sending an e-mail to users or escalating overdue work items to management. A workflow engine facilitates the flow of information, tasks, and events. Workflow engines may also be referred to as a Workflow Orchestration Engines.

The workflow engines mainly have three functions:

• Verification of the current status: Check whether the command is valid in executing a task.
• Determine the authority of users: Check if the current user is permitted to execute the task.
• Executing condition script: After passing the previous two steps, workflow engine begins to evaluate condition script in which two processes are carried out, if the condition is true, workflow engine execute the task, and if execution successfully complete, it returns the success, if not, it reports the error to trigger and roll back the change.

Workflow engine is the core technique for task allocation software application, such as BPM in which workflow engine allocates task to different executors with communicating data among participants. A workflow engine can execute any arbitrary sequence of steps. For example, a workflow engine can be used to execute a sequence of steps which compose a healthcare data analysis.

See Comparison of BPEL engines

Comparison of BPEL engines

This article is a comparison of BPEL and BPMN engines.- See also :* Business Process Execution Language* Comparison of business integration software...

 for a list of work flow engines using the Business Process Execution Language.