Patent ID: 8566796

Claim:
A computer-implemented method for accessing real time data, comprising: providing a graphical interface for communicating with a software probe, wherein the software probe is an instrumented software probe that facilitates capturing output metric data, and wherein the graphical interface facilitates real-time bi-directional interaction with the software probe; inserting, using one or more data processors, the software probe into application code associated with an application, wherein the software probe monitors a performance of the application code without recompiling the application code; automatically initializing, using the one or more data processors, communication with the software probe during runtime of the application by: monitoring a communication port, wherein monitoring includes receiving a query on the communication port, and wherein the query is received from the software probe; and determining whether the query references a specified host, wherein determining includes ascertaining whether a host variable is specified by the query; creating a socket for communicating with the software probe, wherein creating a socket includes executing a probe initialization routine, wherein the probe initialization routine is operable to: connect, through a default output port, to a probe communication application on a local host, when the query does not reference a specified host; and connect to an output port to which a probe communication application is listening; receiving command instructions via the graphical interface, wherein the command instructions are executable by the software probe and are disposed to cause the software probe to collect data corresponding to application code associated with a running application; analyzing the command instructions, wherein analyzing includes determining an insertion position for inserting the command instructions within the software probe; compiling the command instructions to provide proper syntax for execution of the command instructions within the software probe; inserting the compiled command instructions into software probe code while the software probe code is within the application code, wherein inserting is performed during runtime of the application with which the application code is associated; receiving, using the one or more data processors, collected data from the software probe; and providing the collected data for display on the graphical interface, wherein the graphical interface facilitates real-time interaction with the collected data.