State in BPMN diagram

Question

How to represent state in BPMN diagrams?

I have a BPMN diagram describing behavior of an entity. There are some actions and arrows between the actions. I would like to express that between two given actions the entity is in a particular state.

Is is possible in BPMN?

Answer 1

In BPMN Data Modeling is used for such aim. In process modelling it is essential to model the items (objects) which are manipulated and used during the execution of the process. The most common element for doing this in BPMN is Data Object, which is typically pictured like this

According BPMN 2.0 specification:

The primary construct for modeling data within the Process flow is the DataObject element. A DataObject has a well-defined lifecycle, with resulting access constraints.
The Data Object class is an item-aware element. Data Object elements MUST be contained within Process or Sub- Process elements.

Moreover, if we stick to your question, there is special attribute of Data Object which is called DataState. According the specification:

Data Object elements can optionally reference a DataState element, which is the state of the data contained in the Data Object. The definition of these states, e.g., possible values and any specific semantic are out of scope of this International Standard.

As you can see, these states are not well-documented and implemented not by all vendors. For example, Camunda supports it.