Methods and devices for unwinding stack of frozen program and for restarting the program from unwound state
US6009258A · kind A · utility
Assignee
Inventor
Key dates
| Filing date | Sep 26, 1997 |
| Grant date | Dec 28, 1999 |
| Priority date | — |
| Expiry date | Sep 26, 2017 |
Classification
- Technology area (CPC G)Physics
- CPC primaryG06F2201/83
- WIPO fieldComputer technology
- WIPO sectorElectrical engineering
Abstract
StackTrace refers generally here to an apparatus and computer method for use with multitasking operating systems (OS's) such as WINDOWS.RTM.95. StackTrace allows a program to again become responsive to OS messages after the program freezes. A user can then save work which was not yet saved at the time the program froze. In one mode, StackTrace identifies a special signature that appears in the virtual stacks of certain kinds of programs. This special signature is a consistently-used return address to a standard-for-type calling function of the OS. StackTrace locates the special signature in the virtual stack of the frozen program and then changes values stored in context registers of the frozen program to cause a return through the in-stack signature location as would have happened if the halted program function had successfully completed. StackTrace then initiates multitasked processing of the program so that the program will return by using the in-stack signature location. This enables the program to become responsive to messages from the OS.
Source: USPTO / EPO open patent data. Objective bibliographic and citation counts.