Crisis Management Use Case

ARMINES

This use case shows the value added of the PLAY platform in the context of the response to a nuclear crisis. It consists in the construction of a simulation tool to validate the complex- event processing architecture and the associated platform.

- The heterogeneity of actors is taken into account. Actors involved operate with their own information system, which may already use web services, but may also be fairly basic.
- High volumes of heterogeneous information is exchanged
- Changes in orchestration (internal business processes) or in choreography (interactions between processes) are possible. and driven by events

The multiplicity of actors, the volume and heterogeneity of information exchanged and the complexity of the situation in this use case enable a sound and comprehensive demonstration of PLAY’s contribution.

PLAY provides an increased situational awareness, together with a timely and adequate diffusion of relevant information to actors.

The simulation tool will be based on ESB technology and on web-services orchestration to simulate various collaborative workflows, actors’ behaviors and events production.
Implementing a real exercise implying all the expected actors, services and events is not an easy task. The simulation tool compensates this difficulty and enables the validation of the complex- event processing architecture.
We suppose that a business service matches with a single technical operation (i.e. a single operation of a WebService).

Use Case Description:

A large quantity of radioactive substance is accidentally released in the atmosphere, due to a critical accident in a French nuclear plant. The multiplicity and diversity of actors involved, the volume and heterogeneity of information, the critical dependencies between actions as well as the dynamics of the situation make the situation more complex.
All these characteristics make this use case a relevant illustration for Internet of Services, although it is not easy to imagine this context as a strongly computed environment where services could easily send their events to the clouds.
With its complex-event processing architecture, PLAY can contribute significantly. The management of the crisis would indeed be facilitated by the increased situational awareness provided by PLAY’s platform for event processing. In addition to that, PLAY would ensure a timely and adequate diffusion of information to relevant actors.

The first step of the use case is to gather knowledge about the current situation (“as-is” analysis).
The second step consists in proposing a structured analysis of the situation, as it would be if PLAY platform was used to facilitate the management of the crisis. (“to-be” analysis)
The third step is to build a tool to simulate various collaborative workflows, actors’ behaviour, and event production.

Figure 1 : Actors and events of the use case

Each actor on the field has a delegate in the crisis cell, or decision centre. The aim of our simulation tool is to facilitate coordination between actors. To simulate this coordination between actors, the prototype is based on specific information systems. Those specificities include :
-    Service oriented architecture (SOA).
-    For each business service, a single technical operation (i.e. a single operation of a WebService) exists in the information system.

They allow us to transform the three kind of crisis response processes (decisional, operational and support processes) in workflows and to support the agility of both choreography and orchestration. (see Figure 1)

To this end, three iterations are planned :
1.    Construction of a generic tool (due end of March 2011)
2.    First demonstration with a fairly simple scenario (due end of June 2011)
3.    Second demonstration, with a complex scenario (due end of October 2011)

As many stakeholders are involved in the crisis management process, discussions with IRSN, France’s public service expert in nuclear and radiation risks as well as with Nuclear plants technical experts or field actors such as firemen are undergoing.

For more information on this use case, please contact

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