Enhanced graphical development environment for controlling program flow
First Claim
1. A computer system having a display means, said computer system providing a graphical development environment for users, said computer system comprising:
- means for graphically representing a program flow as a plurality of icons connected by at least one first arrow on the display means;
means for changing the program flow by adding an icon having a functionality onto the first arrow, wherein the added icon represents a subroutine having overwritable components;
means for automatically adding second arrows representing the functionality of the icon to the program flow;
means for adding additional icons onto the second arrows; and
means for graphically indicating whether the subroutine has been overwritten.
3 Assignments
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Accused Products
Abstract
A graphical development environment for developing the program flow of an application. The environment represents the program flow as an arrow between starting and end points. A developer can modify the program flow by adding an icon representing a subroutine to any point on the arrow. Loops and possible returns of a subroutine are graphically represented by the environment. If the developer modifies the API of a subroutine, the environment graphically represents the calling routines that are affected by the API change. The environment also allows functional components of subroutines to be overwritten by the caller. In such a case, the overwritten components are executing within the caller'"'"'s environment space. Different overwritten instances of an overwritable subroutine may exist in the same program flow.
177 Citations
18 Claims
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1. A computer system having a display means, said computer system providing a graphical development environment for users, said computer system comprising:
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means for graphically representing a program flow as a plurality of icons connected by at least one first arrow on the display means; means for changing the program flow by adding an icon having a functionality onto the first arrow, wherein the added icon represents a subroutine having overwritable components; means for automatically adding second arrows representing the functionality of the icon to the program flow; means for adding additional icons onto the second arrows; and means for graphically indicating whether the subroutine has been overwritten. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6)
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7. A computer program product having a computer readable medium having computer program logic recorded thereon for graphically developing an application on a display means, the computer program product comprising:
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means for graphically representing a program flow as a plurality of icons connected by at least one first arrow on the display means; means for changing the program flow by adding an icon having a functionality onto the first arrow, wherein the added icon represents a subroutine having overwritable components; means for automatically adding second arrows representing the functionality of the icon to the program flow; means for adding additional icons onto the second arrows; and means for graphically indicating whether the subroutine has been overwritten. - View Dependent Claims (8, 9, 10, 11, 12)
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13. A method of developing an application on a computer system having display means, comprising the steps of:
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graphically representing a program flow as a plurality of icons connected by at least one first arrow on the display means; changing the program flow by adding an icon having a functionality onto the first arrow, wherein the added icon represents a subroutine having overwritable components; automatically adding second arrows representing the functionality of the icon to the program flow; adding additional icons onto the second arrows; and graphically indicating whether the subroutine has been overwritten. - View Dependent Claims (14, 15, 16, 17, 18)
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Specification