Patent ID: 8775962

Claim:
A computer implemented method for iteratively displaying and changing a display in a graphical user interface for a distributed computing environment to navigate through states of an information technology management process, comprising: displaying computing objects and relationships between respective ones of the computing objects in the distributed computing environment in a graphical user interface on a computer, wherein a plurality of selectable objects are displayed in a display in a first display window of the graphical user interface, and the computing objects and relationships are displayed in a display in a second display window of the graphical user interface, and wherein a user navigates through states of an information technology management process displayed in the graphical user interface by selecting or deselecting the selectable objects in the first display window; responsive to selection of an object of the plurality of selectable objects displayed in the first display window, changing the display in the first display window to represent a first state of the information technology management process based on the selected object, wherein the first display window includes a first set of associated selectable objects associated with the selected object, and changing the display in the second display window to show the selected object and computing objects and relationships associated with the selected object; and responsive to selection of an associated selectable object of the first set of associated selectable objects, changing the display in the first display window to represent a transition to a second state of the information technology management process, wherein the first display window includes a second set of associated selectable objects associated with the selected associated object of the first set of associated objects and changing the display in the second display window to show the selected associated object and computing objects and relationships associated with the selected associated object of the first set of associated selectable objects.