Creating a Process Mining project

You can create a Process Mining project by using the following data sources:

  • Your own .csv event log files.
  • A pre-build configuration and reused backup that contains data, settings, configuration, and custom metrics from different projects in your organization.

You can also use the following external data sources as event logs:

  • A data stream event log integration through IBM Event Streams, Kafka, or IBM MQ. For more information, see Data stream.
  • A schedule source retrieval from a cloud storage through IBM Cloud Object Storage, AWS S3, or Azure Blob Storage. For more information, see Schedule source.

You can also upload your master data as object tables to analyze it in the Analytics section without analyzing a process. To do so, upload your tables with master data as an event log and use the Object tables tab to create a project. To learn more, see Using the Analytics page and Object tables.

Creating a project with existing event logs

To create a process-mining project with your own .csv log files, do the following steps:

  1. Click Create a process-mining project on the home page.

  2. In the Create a process-mining project window:

    1. Type the name of the project.
    2. Follow one of these steps:
      • To link the project to an existing organization, click Use existing organization, and select the organization from the Organization name dropdown.
      • To link the project to a new organization, click Create new organization, and type the name of the organization.
    3. Optional: Tick the Retrieve data and backup from legacy project checkbox in the project creation window and choose the Legacy project that you want to migrate. For more information, see Migrating Legacy project to IBM Process Mining 2.0.

  3. In the Data source page, click Upload file to add a data source for the project.

All file names must adhere to the UTF-8 standards.

You can add more than one data source to IBM Process Mining. Check whether the number of columns and format are consistent between the data sources.

When you create a project with a CSV file, you might get the following error message: Empty line required at the end of the CSV file. To fix the problem, enter a carriage return (empty line) after the last record of your file.

  1. Optional: Add a backup file or a reference model.

  2. In the Edit data mapping page, map the data to the relevant column heading:

    1. Map the Process ID parameter with the column that indicates unique data.
    2. Map the data with all the columns heading to better analyze the process and the subsequent activities.

IBM Process Mining categorizes data mapping to the following three types:

  • Required
    Indicates the fields that you must map to data for proper functioning of the application, for example, Process ID, Activity, and Start time.
  • Optional
    Indicates the fields that you can map for better visualization of the process, for example, Process ID (optional), End time, Resource, and Role. For example, to use the Activity map and Social net features, you must map the fields Resource and Role to the relevant columns.
  • Custom
    Indicates the fields that you can map for more clarity, for example, Date, Numeric, Amount, Text, and Integer.
    The custom mapping is unavailable for reserved column names such as caseid, activity, role, resource, starttime, and endtime.

To change any one of the mappings, click Clear corresponding to the parameter, and then choose the relevant heading.

  1. In the Configure the time format page, select the time format for your data source.

In IBM Process Mining, you can choose a different time format for time-based mapping that is performed in Data mapping. To use this feature, clear the Use same time format for all dates checkbox, and select a different time format.

  1. Optional: In the Custom configuration page, select the required fields and format for all your custom fields from the Map your data.

  2. Click Create project.

Creating a project from pre-build configurations

You can use a backup and import the following configurations to your new project:

  • Field mapping
  • Activity costs
  • Activity working time
  • Resource costs
  • Role costs
  • Project settings
  • Replay settings
  • Custom metrics

To use a backup configuration click the popup in the Data source section or use the Backup & History section in the Project tab.

For more information, see Backup & History.