Methods and systems for data-focused debugging and tracing capabilities

• US 20060294158A1
• Filed: 05/26/2006
• Published: 12/28/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 04/22/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: SAP SE
• Original Assignee: SAP AG (SAP SE)
• Inventors: Stulski, Vitaliy, Tsyganskiy, Igor, Gomov, Vyacheslav, Liakh, Dmitri
• Granted Patent: US 7,958,486 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/72 Code refactoring

Abstract

Embodiments of methods and systems consistent with the present invention enable data-focused analysis of an application by reorganizing execution information generated by an application into categories associated with the data objects used by the application, and displaying or otherwise using the reorganized information for analysis, debugging, execution tracing, etc. of the application. Thus, the application execution information is presented from the data standpoint instead of from the execution sequence standpoint.

Claims

1. A method of presenting business application execution information, comprising:

executing the business application;

creating an execution log containing information regarding operations and data of the business application in execution sequence order;

identifying a set of objects used by the business application;

organizing the information in the execution log according to the set of objects; and

presenting the organized information according to the set of objects.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein organizing further comprises:

associating each entry in the execution log with an object that the entry affected during execution of the business application.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein presenting further comprises:

creating a hierarchical display having the set of objects as top level nodes of the hierarchy and the organized information in the execution log as subnodes of the top level nodes.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein the subnodes are arranged in chronological order of execution.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the information from the execution log regarding the operations and data of the business application comprises a plurality of log entries, and further comprising:

assigning an indicator to a log entry from the plurality of log entries signifying how the log entry affected an object in the set of objects, and where presenting further comprises;

displaying a representation of the assigned indicator with a representation of the log entry.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein identifying further comprises:

matching the information regarding the operations and data of the business application with a predefined set of objects that model the business objects used in the business application.

7. A method of organizing a plurality of entries regarding a plurality of operations of a business application during execution, comprising:

recording an execution log containing the plurality of entries in execution order, wherein an entry of the plurality of entries contains information regarding an operation of the plurality of operations, and wherein the information indicates an object affected by the operation;

reorganizing the recorded execution log such that the entry containing information regarding the operation is associated with a category corresponding to the object;

displaying a representation of the category corresponding to the object; and

displaying a representation of the entry containing information regarding the operation associated with the category so as to visually associate the representation of the entry with the representation of the category.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein the category corresponding to the object is an object class.

9. The method of claim 7, further comprising:

displaying a representation of a second entry containing information regarding the operation associated with the category so as to visually associate the representation of the second entry with the representation of the category.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein the representation of the entry and the representation of the second entry are displayed in execution order.

11. The method of claim 7, further comprising:

displaying the representation of the category corresponding to the object among a plurality of representations of categories corresponding to a plurality of objects according to a category identifier provided by a user.

12. The method of claim 7, further comprising:

assigning an indicator to the entry containing information regarding the operation based on how the operation affected the object; and

displaying a representation of the assigned indicator so as to visually associate the representation of the assigned indicator with the representation of the entry.

13. The method of claim 12, wherein the assigned indicator indicates whether the entry modified the object.

14. The method of claim 7, wherein displaying a representation of the entry containing information regarding the operation associated with the category further comprises:

displaying a value associated with the object before the operation executed; and

displaying a second value associated with the object after the operation executed.

15. The method of claim 7, further comprising:

sorting the plurality of object-oriented elements according to a chronological order of the plurality of operations.

16. A system for organizing a plurality of entries regarding a plurality of operations of a business application during execution, comprising:

means for recording an execution log containing the plurality of entries in execution order, wherein an entry of the plurality of entries contains information regarding an operation of the plurality of operations, and wherein the information indicates an object affected by the operation;

means for reorganizing the recorded execution log such that the entry containing information regarding the operation is associated with a category corresponding to the object;

means for displaying a representation of the category corresponding to the object; and

means for displaying a representation of the entry containing information regarding the operation associated with the category so as to visually associate the representation of the entry with the representation of the category.

17. The system of claim 16, wherein the category corresponding to the object is an object class.

18. The system of claim 16, further comprising:

means for displaying a representation of a second entry containing information regarding the operation associated with the category so as to visually associate the representation of the second entry with the representation of the category.

19. The system of claim 18, wherein the representation of the entry and the representation of the second entry are displayed in execution order.

20. The system of claim 16, further comprising:

means for assigning an indicator to the entry containing information regarding the operation based on how the operation affected the object; and

means for displaying a representation of the assigned indicator so as to visually associate the representation of the assigned indicator with the representation of the entry.