Workflow engine?

[Grzegorz Staniak]

On 09.11.2008, Tino Wildenhain <tino at wildenhain.de> wroted:

>>> I think that was part of the problem.. you asked if the wheel had
>>> already been invented, rather than tell us about the stones you have
>>> to haul up a mountain, and whether a wheel is what you need.  It's
>>> difficult to answer your original question.. someone could have just
>>> as easily said that you should consider Sharepoint and not bother
>>> writing any code.
>> 
>> Aw, come on. The problem was only mentioned, but the question was pretty
>> specific: could you comment on/recommend an open source python workflow 
>> engine/module (implied: to go with a web app). Sharepoint doesn't match 
>> the description. I think one could assume that if I'm asking about wheels, 
>> I need a pointer to a wheel shop, and I'm not instead making a disguised 
>> request for people to analyze my problem for me.
>
> Well if we can see you are asking for "what is the best wheel ..."
> and we can deduct from your mail that you are tying to build a
> sleigh

I can't see how possibly you could deduce anything like that from 
what I wrote. I need to implement workflow, I asked about workflow. 
If I was to continue with the metaphor: I asked about a wheel shop
and the reply was "better think about the rest of the cart, building
yourself a set of wheels is a trivial task". Which of course may be
true, and of course people with much more experience than I have 
may implement the required FSMs in half an hour, but that's not what 
I asked about.

[...]
> And so if you are asking about the "best workflow engine to base the 
> work on" you are obviously in a similar situation. This question
> implies that you are maybe not really aware of what a workflow engine
> is and does apart from the nice word.

I'm sorry, but you're misrepresenting my words. I didn't say anything 
about "best workflow engine", I asked for _any_ suggestions or comments.
Most of them happened to be along the lines of "phew, that's too easy,
go bother yourself with the rest of the stuff". 

> The common denonimator of a workflow (state engine) is so simple, the
> only complexity comes from the environment it needs to drive.
>
> So in short: I doubt there is a general solution to the problem.

Well, from the little research I did it seems some people try anyway.
I doubt they are all just trendy buzzwords lovers.

GS
-- 
Grzegorz Staniak <gstaniak _at_ wp [dot] pl>
Nocturnal Infiltration and Accurate Killing