Process Interface evaluation

[schettino72]

I think this is a great criteria that makes a lot of difference in the "easiness" of creating certain workflows.
But the evaluations options has too much focus on being well defined...

1. The workflow system is purely file-based and does not define interface formats.

2. The workflow system has a file and non-file based interface, where the non-file based inputs are well defined.

3. The workflow system has a file and non-file based interface, where both the file and non-file based inputs are well defined.

doit is being classified as 1, that is not correct.
Although it could also not be classified as 2 because the interface is not well-defined.

I guess you should add another level or drop the "well defined" for 2.

[joergfunger]

The focus of that requirement was that (in particular when multiple users are working on some parts of a workflow) it is advantageous to define interfaces (that in theory could even be checked a priori. This is often tricky for files since one could certainly define some structure and then test that, but there was no tool providing that currently. As for non-file parameters, a couple of tools provide a direct definition of the type. which makes it easier to jointly work on this since one can clearly define the interfaces (and even get errors if a task does return something else). In that sense, the focus of this requirement was really the interface definition. On the other hand, I agree that the information of allowing file and non-file based parameters being passed is another criterium. We will discuss that in our next meeting to evaluate, if we should introduce another criterium or modify the current one. Thanks a lot for your valuable input.