Patent ID: 8713529

Claim:
A method comprising: compiling, by a processing device, source code into optimized code; identifying, by a processing device during the compiling, a memory pointer in the source code, wherein the memory pointer corresponds to a first value in the source code and serves as a referencing link to a second value in memory; when the memory pointer is optimized away during the compiling of the source code, replacing the memory pointer with an implicit pointer that comprises an implicit reference link between the first value and second value, wherein the implicit reference link previously provided as an explicit reference link by the memory pointer in the source code before the compiling and comprising an annotation link that is maintained between a first annotation associated with the first value and a second annotation providing information leading to a location storing the second value; and generating, by the processing device, the compiled code and a compiler-generated debug output associated with the compiled code, the compiler-generated debug output comprising annotations in a debug format, the annotations comprising at least the implicit reference link.