About Gateway Types

Gateway

Behavior

Exclusive (XOR, or Unsynchronized OR)

Diverging behavior:

Only one of the available output transition paths can be taken.

The default transition path (optional) is taken if none of the conditions on the other transition paths are true.

If no transition path is true and a default path is not available, a run-time exception occurs.

Converging behavior:

Each input transition path is routed to the output transition path without synchronization (an Unsynchronized OR join).

Inclusive (OR, or Synchronized OR)

Diverging behavior:

All of the available output transition paths that evaluate to true are taken. That is, parallel output transition paths are possible.

The default transition path (optional) is taken if none of the conditions on the other transition paths are true.

If no transition path is true and a default path is not available, a run-time exception occurs.

Converging behavior:

All input transition paths are merged in a synchronized OR join.

Complex (webMethods)

Diverging behavior is based on output transition conditions. Converging behavior supports join types: AND, OR, and unsynchronized OR. A join timeout is supported.

Note:

Current webMethods gateways migrate to complex gateways visually only (no generation or model changes).

Parallel (AND)

Diverging behavior:

All of the available output transition paths that evaluate to true are taken. That is, parallel output transition paths are possible.

The default transition path (optional) is taken if none of the conditions on the other transition paths are true.

If no transition path is true and a default path is not available, a run-time exception occurs.

Converging behavior:

All input transition paths are merged in an AND join (waits for all inbound paths). A join timeout is supported.

For example, you can configure an exclusive gateway with two separate output transition with two separate but identical conditions, expecting that each path will be taken when the conditions are matched. However, only one of the paths will be randomly selected, because single-path operation is the defined behavior of an exclusive gateway. For this scenario, the best choice is an inclusive gateway.