Patent ID: 8899343

Claim:
A method comprising: determining a first execution path in a program that has been executed a largest number of times, as compared to at least one other path in the program; replacing swapped instructions, in the program, that are not on the first execution path with breakpoints; and replacing a plurality of contiguous breakpoints of the breakpoints, in the program, the plurality of contiguous breakpoints not being on the first execution path, with a single control word that specifies the number of the plurality of contiguous breakpoints that the single control word replaces; wherein said program is executable by replacing the control word with the number of contiguous breakpoints specified by the control word without executing the control word, and accessing one or more entries in a breakpoint table, each entry corresponding to a respective location of a breakpoint of the contiguous breakpoints, to obtain a respective swapped instruction corresponding to the respective location of the breakpoint of the contiguous breakpoints.