Method for back tracing program execution
US6353924B1 · kind B1 · utility
Assignee
Inventors
Key dates
| Filing date | Feb 8, 1999 |
| Grant date | Mar 5, 2002 |
| Priority date | — |
| Expiry date | Feb 8, 2019 |
Classification
- Technology area (CPC G)Physics
- CPC primaryG06F2201/86
- WIPO fieldComputer technology
- WIPO sectorElectrical engineering
Abstract
A method of back-tracing execution of a computer program, where the computer program comprises a plurality of blocks, comprises instrumenting an original version of the program by adding instrumentation code to some or all of the blocks to form an instrumented program. Instrumentation can be added at the binary or source level, or at link time. The instrumentation code records execution sequence information upon execution of the corresponding instrumented block to create a trace record of the executed program. The execution sequence information for each block comprises a block identifier which identifies the corresponding block. A detailed back-trace is generated, after the program has executed, by replacing each recorded block identifier with program counters associated with each instruction in the corresponding block. The application may comprise several programs or subprograms, in which case separate regions of memory can be maintained. Each region is associated with a program or subprogram or a set of programs or subprograms and stores therein part of the trace record corresponding to the associated set of programs or subprograms. The trace records themselves may be of differen…
Source: USPTO / EPO open patent data. Objective bibliographic and citation counts.