Patent Application

App. No. 11/956,477

Abstract

Claims (47)

1 . A computer-implemented method comprising:

receiving a code to be analyzed;

running a flow analysis of the received code;

running a backward analysis, whereby the backward analysis returns at least one input statement;

selecting at least one externally-visible input statement from the returned list of input statements;

associating each externally-visible input statement with its appropriate user-language description; and

supplying the at least one user-language description that is associated with the externally-visible input statement.

2 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the at least one user-language description is supplied to a human user and further comprising the step of adapting the user-language description to the human user.

3 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the at least one user-language description supplied is coupled with at least one of the following: a statement, trace, and a graphical flow representation.

4 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the at least one user-language description supplied is coupled with at least one graphical flow representation, and the graphical flow representation comprises at least one of the following: a flow chart comprising code statements, user-language description elements, and a flow chart comprising externally-visible statements.

5 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the flow analysis is outputting a graph or an index; the graph comprises at least one externally-visible input statement and at least one externally-visible output statement; wherein the externally-visible statements are selected from the group of: input statements, output statements, user exits, and a combination thereof.

6 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the externally-visible input statement is selected from the group of: a read from file statement, a read from table statement, a read from GUI statement, and a combination thereof.

7 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the step of associating each externally-visible input statement with its appropriate user-language description, when the externally-visible input statement is a read from a file or read from a table, comprises the steps of: searching for a statement that writes to the file or table; and identifying the user interface element that is associated with the statement that writes to the file or table; whereby the identified user interface element is used for the user-language description.

8 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the step of associating each externally-visible input statement with its appropriate user-language description comprises at least one of the following steps: utilizing a list of predefined externally-visible input statements and their corresponding user-language descriptions, and identifying the user-language description by matching a predefined functional criterion.

9 . A computer-implemented method comprising:

receiving a code to be analyzed;

running a flow analysis of the received code;

running a forward analysis, whereby the forward analysis returns at least one output statement;

selecting at least one externally-visible output statement from the returned list of output statements;

associating each externally-visible output statement with its appropriate user-language description; and

supplying the at least one user-language description that is associated with the externally-visible output statement.

10 . The method of claim 9 , further comprising the step of adapting the user-language description to a human user, and the at least one user-language description supplied is coupled with at least one of the following: a statement, a trace, a graphical flow representation, a flow chart comprising code statements, a flow chart comprising user-language description elements, and a flow chart comprising externally-visible statements.

11 . The method of claim 9 , wherein the user-language descriptions are screens, and the screens are classified according to their conceptual type.

12 . The method of claim 9 , wherein the flow analysis is outputting a graph and the graph comprises at least one externally-visible input statement and at least one externally-visible output statement, whereby the externally-visible statements are selected from the group of: input statements, output statements, user exits, and a combination thereof.

13 . The method of claim 9 , wherein the flow analysis is outputting an index and the index comprises at least one externally-visible input statement list and at least one externally-visible output statement list, whereby the externally-visible statements are selected from the group of: input statements, output statements, user exits, and a combination thereof.

14 . The method of claim 9 , wherein the user-language description is selected from the group of screens and transactions and the step of associating each externally-visible output statement with its appropriate user-language description comprises using the semantics of the externally-visible output statement.

15 . A computer-implemented method comprising:

receiving a code to be analyzed;

running a flow analysis of the received code, wherein the flow analysis is outputting a pointer graph;

following the pointer graph and locating at least one relevant externally-visible variable;

associating the at least one relevant externally-visible variable with its appropriate user-language description; and

supplying the at least one user-language description that is associated with the at least one externally-visible variable.

16 . The method of claim 15 , further comprising the step of adapting the user-language description to a human user, and wherein the at least one user-language description supplied is coupled with at least one of the following: a variable, a trace, a graphical flow representation, a flow chart comprising user-language description elements, and a flow chart comprising externally-visible variables.

17 . The method of claim 15 , wherein the user-language descriptions are screens, and the screens are classified according to their conceptual type.

18 . The method of claim 15 , wherein the pointer graph comprises vertices and edges, wherein the vertices comprise variables and the edges comprise connections between pointing variables and pointed variables; at least one of the variables is an externally-visible variable selected from the group of: input variables, and output variables.

19 . The method of claim 15 , wherein the step of following the pointer graph comprises following the pointer graph backwards and locating at least one externally-visible input variable.

20 . The method of claim 15 , wherein the step of following the pointer graph comprises following the pointer graph forwards and locating at least one externally-visible output variable.

21 . A computer-implemented method comprising:

receiving a flow analysis of a code;

running a code analysis, whereby the code analysis returns a list of statements;

selecting at least one externally-visible statement from the returned list of statements;

receiving a user-language description for each selected externally-visible statement; and

supplying the received user-language descriptions.

22 . The method of claim 21 , further comprising the step of adapting the user-language description to a human user, and supplying the user-language description coupled with at least one of the following: a statement, a trace, and a graphical flow representation.

23 . The method of claim 21 , wherein the user-language descriptions are screens, and the screens are classified according to their conceptual type.

24 . The method of claim 21 , wherein the code analysis is a backward slicing analysis and the returned list of statements is a list of input statements.

25 . The method of claim 21 , wherein the code analysis is a forward slicing analysis and the returned list of statements is a list of output statements.

Assignments (10)