Complex Event Processing (CEP)

Complex Event Processing (CEP) is a set of technologies that allows events to be processed on a continuous basis.

Most conventional event processing software is used either for Business Process Management (BPM), TIBCO ActiveMatrix® BPM for example, or for Service Oriented Architecture (SOA), for example TIBCO ActiveMatrix® BusinessWorks software.

CEP is unlike conventional event processing technologies, however, in that it treats all events as potentially significant and records them asynchronously.

Applications that are appropriate for CEP are event-driven, which implies some aspect of real-time behavior. The typical CEP application area can be identified as having some aspect of “situation awareness,” “sense and respond,” or “track and trace” aspects which overlap in actual business situations.

Situation Awareness
Situation awareness is about "knowing" the state of the product, person, document, or entity of interest at any point in time. Achieving this knowledge requires continuous monitoring of events to do with the entity, events that indicate what situation or state the entity is in, or about to be in. As an example, a dashboard indicates all performance indicators for a runtime production process. All the production plant events are monitored and the situation, or health, of the production process is determined via some performance indicators that are shown in real-time to one or more operators.
Sense and Respond
This aspect is about detecting some significant fact about the product, person, document or entity of interest, and responding accordingly. To achieve this result the software does the following:
  • Monitors events that indicate what is happening to this entity.
  • Detects when something significant occurs.
  • Executes the required response.

As an example, you may monitor cell phone or credit card usage, detect that a cell phone or credit card is being used consecutively at locations that are too far apart for real-time person-to-business transactions. Detection of such transactions indicates that an act of fraud is in progress. The system responds accordingly, denying the transactions, and invoking the necessary workflow to handle the situation as defined in standard procedures.

Track and trace
This aspect is about tracking the product, person, document or entity of interest over time and tracing pertinent facts like location, owner, or general status. An example would be tracking events from an RFID-enabled inventory control system where at any point in time you need to know how many widgets are in what location.

“Situation awareness,” “sense and respond,” and “track and trace” can all be classified as types of activity monitoring, for which the continuous evaluation of incoming events is suitable. For this reason, CEP is often described as a generalization of Business Activity Monitoring (BAM), although the event processing task may be only indirectly related to business, as in the case of an engine monitoring application or process routing task.