Workflow as a Service (WFaaS)

Workflow as a Service (WFaaS)

 

We built the "Workflow as a Service" (WFaaS) model to support workflow publishing, query, and execution in the Cloud. The following publications demonstrate how the WFaaS architecture:

  • enables composition of multiple software packages and services based on the logic encapsulated within a workflow service
  • facilitates a service and management environment for flexible application integration via workflows
  • utilizing other cloud services, such as IaaS and DaaS, provides interfaces to get proper data, software packages, and VMs for workflow execution
  • allows for management of multiple concurrently running workflows and virtual machines in the Cloud

Based on this architecture, we researched and benchmarked heuristic workflow scheduling algorithms for optimized workflow execution in the Cloud. For different application scenarios, we experimented with multiple algorithms to find proper configurations for reduced cost and increase price/performance ratio without affecting much performance.