Tools and techniques for instrumenting interfaces of units of a software program

• US 20050183094A1
• Filed: 04/01/2005
• Published: 08/18/2005
• Est. Priority Date: 10/02/1998
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Hunt, Galen C.
• Granted Patent: US 7,493,630 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 719/315
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/449 Object-oriented method invocation or resolution
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/465 Distributed object oriented systems remote method invocation [RMI] G06F9/548
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/5066 Algorithms for mapping a plurality of inter-dependent sub-tasks onto a plurality of physical CPUs mappping at compile time, see G06F8/451
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/0864 Round trip delays
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/0894 Packet rate
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/10 in which an application is distributed across nodes in the network software deployment G06F8/60; multiprogramming arrangements G06F9/46

Abstract

An automatic distributed partitioning system (ADPS) determines which unit exposes an interface in a framework in which units lack reliable identities. The ADPS detects a reference to an interface. For the interface, the ADPS assures that the unit that exposes the interface is identified. Using unit identities, the ADPS performs operations such as profiling of an application or classifying units of an application. An interface wrapper for the interface stores the identity of the unit that exposes the interface, as well as information about the interface and a reference to instrumentation. When a client unit calls a member function of an interface, the interface wrapper intercepts the call and invokes the instrumentation. The instrumentation performs an operation such as profiling the application or classifying a unit. The ADPS detects when an interface is undocumented, and handles undocumented interfaces without invoking the full instrumentation capabilities of the ADPS. When the ADPS detects an undocumented interface, the ADPS notes a pair-wise location constraint for the units that communicate across the undocumented interface.

Claims

1-66. -66. (canceled)

67. A computer-readable medium having stored thereon a data structure, comprising:

a first data field containing data representing a reference to instrumentation;

a second data field containing data representing a reference to an interface as a whole of a unit of a software program wherein the software program comprises plural units and wherein if the interface reference is present, then the interface has been wrapped;

a third data field containing data representing an identity of the unit of the software program; and

a fourth data field containing data for use by the instrumentation.

68. The computer-readable medium of claim 67 wherein the reference to instrumentation comprises a pointer to a table comprising at least one pointer to one or more instrumentation functions.

69. The computer-readable medium of claim 67 wherein the fourth data field contains a reference to interface information stored outside of the data structure.

70. The computer-readable medium of claim 67 wherein the instrumentation references the type description to parse and measure one or more parameters passed across the interface.

71. The computer-readable medium of claim 70 wherein the instrumentation uses the one or more parameters to parse and measures one or more return parameters from a function call.

72. The computer-readable medium of claim 67 wherein the fourth data field contains information about function calls passed to and from the interface.

73. The computer-readable medium of claim 67 wherein the fourth data field contains information about parameter data types passed to and from the interface.

74. The computer-readable medium of claim 67 wherein the reference to a type description file for the interface comprises a description of the parameters of the wrapped interface.

75. The computer-readable medium of claim 67 wherein the reference to a type description file for the interface comprises a globally unique identifier.

76. The computer-readable medium of claim 67 wherein the data associated with the wrapped interface comprises a pointer wherein the pointer references data stored elsewhere.

77. The computer-readable medium of claim 67 wherein the data representing a reference to an interface of a unit of a software program comprises a pointer to a table, the table comprising at least one pointer to one or more interfaces.

78. The computer readable medium of claim 67 wherein the reference to instrumentation comprises a pointer to a table comprising at least one pointer to one or more instrumentation functions.

79. The computer readable medium of claim 67 wherein the data in the fourth field comprises data representing a log of activity over the interface.

80. The computer-readable medium of claim 67, the interface having a member function, wherein a client unit receives a reference to the instrumentation when the client unit tries to reference the interface member function.

81. The computer-readable medium of claim 67, wherein the computer-readable medium is computer memory.

82. A method of processing data stored in a data structure in computer memory, the method comprising:

in response to input to a software program, processing data in the data structure, the data structure comprising;

a first data field containing data representing a reference to instrumentation;

a second data field containing data representing a reference to an interface as a whole of a unit of the software program wherein the software program comprises plural units and wherein if the interface reference is present, then the interface has been wrapped;

a third data field containing data representing an identity of the unit of the software program; and

a fourth data field containing data for use by the instrumentation.

83. The method of claim 82 wherein the reference to instrumentation comprises a pointer to a table comprising at least one pointer to one or more instrumentation functions.

84. The method of claim 82 wherein the fourth data field contains a reference to interface information stored outside of the data structure.

85. The method of claim 82 wherein the instrumentation references the type description to parse and measure one or more parameters passed across the interface.

86. A system comprising:

means for storing data in a data structure, the data structure comprising;

a first data field containing data representing a reference to instrumentation,

a second data field containing data representing a reference to an interface as a whole of a unit of a software program wherein the software program comprises plural units and wherein if the interface reference is present, then the interface has been wrapped,

a third data field containing data representing an identity of the unit of the software program, and

a fourth data field containing data for use by the instrumentation; and

means for processing the data in the data structure.