In 2008 I came across a site that was running the workflow back ground process over 10,000 times per day!

Abstract

The issue is that the processing resources of individual workflow items are unknown at establishment date but required on set up. The true cost can only be established when the workflow is implemented and run in a live environment as there are a number of things that can influence the processing requirements (cost) including:

Architecture

Processing load

User behaviors

Once a workflow has been implemented, it is left to the DBA to clear any deferred workflow Items by running one or more workflow background process. The clearance rate is often based on the number accumulating deferred processes and or user requirements to have the Items cleared immediately.

In this paper we will look at two case studies, showing the effect of this “over the wall behavior” and the failure to revisit the workflow definitions.

The paper will also explain the art of purging the workflows.