Patent ID: 7539972

Claim:
A method of visually displaying network changes made with a network objects interaction management tool, comprising: displaying an interactive map representing objects in the network in a software objects tracking panel, wherein the interactive map comprises; one or more graphical icons representing corresponding one or more objects in the network; and one or more graphical line connectors connecting the graphical icons based on the relationships between the one or more objects; receiving a user command to create a new object; detecting the newly created object; automatically refreshing the interactive map in response to the detection of the newly created object, wherein automatically refreshing comprises; generating a graphical icon representing the newly created object and including the newly generated graphical icon in the interactive map; visually indicating whether the addition of the newly created object affects other objects in the network by changing the color or shading of the graphical icons representing the affected other objects, or combinations thereof; and generating or removing, or combinations thereof, the graphical line connectors connecting the graphical icons to reflect changes in the relationships between the one or more objects in the network associated with the addition of the newly created object.