Abstract: A method is described for monitoring a plurality of process instances, such as business process instance. The method comprises: providing a model object reflecting a workflow common to the process instances, the model comprising a plurality of nodes with at least some of the nodes being capable of assuming at least active and blocked states; receiving events and changing the states of the nodes in corresponding model object instances in accordance with the events received so as to reflect the status of the process instances, repeatedly determining an “at risk” state indicator for the model instances, the “at risk” state indicator when set for a model instance indicating that the corresponding workflow instance is in a state in which it cannot progress to a normal completion without encountering a node in the blocked state.

Abstract: A method of analysing data comprising collecting at least one new data sample and using the new data sample and an existing ongoing weighted average based upon at least one earlier data sample to calculate new ongoing weighted average such that a respective weight applied to the at least one earlier data sample used to calculate the existing ongoing weighted average is diminished without needing the value of the at least one earlier data sample to calculate the new ongoing weighted average. A ongoing weighted standard deviation may be used. The method may be used to determine whether a new data sample differs by more than an acceptable amount from earlier data samples.