Patent ID: 8910119

Claim:
A trace display system comprising: a processor having a cache; and a memory coupled to the processor, the memory to store instructions to cause the processor to: generate a navigation map to display a particular linear path to a logical unit of a selected trace having logical units at one or more levels of abstraction, wherein the navigation map comprises: a link to a trace selection phase to begin the navigation map, and at least one trace element corresponding to a logical unit at one level of abstraction of the selected trace; and generate a first informational section to display information specific to a currently selected trace element corresponding to the logical unit of the selected trace at the same time the navigation map is displayed, wherein the first informational section includes at least one link to a second logical unit at a next level of abstraction in the selected trace; receive an input activating the link to the second logical unit of the trace to analyze; adding a second trace element to the navigation map, the second trace element corresponding to the second logical unit at the next level of abstraction in the selected trace; collecting specific information about the second logical unit at the next level of abstraction in the trace; stopping the display of the first information section with the specific information about the first logical unit while the navigation map is displayed; displaying a second informational section with the specific information about the second logical unit of the currently selected trace while the navigation map is displayed, the second informational section providing a selection to a third logical unit at a next level of abstraction in the selected trace; and wherein to generate the navigation map to display only the particular linear path of the selected trace is to display or remove trace elements from the navigation map based on which links to the corresponding logical units are currently activated or deactivated in the generated informational section, and to display the trace elements in order by their respective levels of abstraction in the selected trace, the trace elements on one side of the navigation map corresponding to logical units at higher levels of abstraction and the trace elements on an opposite side of the navigation map corresponding to logical units at lower levels of abstraction; and further wherein data associated with the selected trace is stored in the cache when the trace is selected.