Correlation of source code with system dump information

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9612936-B2
Application number	US-201514805453-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Jul 21, 2015
Priority date	Dec 21, 2012
Publication date	Apr 4, 2017
Grant date	Apr 4, 2017

Abstract

The present arrangements relate to analyzing a software error. At least one dump file created in response to a crash of software executing on a processing system can be accessed. Based on the dump file, a base version of at least one software module that was loaded when the crash occurred can be identified. Based on the dump file, maintenance that has been applied to the at least one software module also can be identified. A report recommending new corrective maintenance to be applied to the at least one software module can be generated.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method of analyzing a crash in software, comprising:
identifying, based on a dump file, a base version of a software module that was loaded when the crash occurred;
identifying, based on the dump file in a hardware processor, maintenance that was previously applied to the software module;
identifying, based upon the base version of the software module and the maintenance that was previously applied to the software module, new corrective maintenance to be applied to the software module;
generating at list file comprising a list of entries corresponding to a plurality of software modules that were loaded when the crash occurred;
extracting, from the dump file, first failure data capture information; and
sorting the list file based upon the extracted first failure data capture information to generat an output file, wherein
the dump file is created in response to the crash.

2. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
generating an output file including:
source code for the software module, and
the maintenance that was previously applied to the software module.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein
the base version is identified by processing memory structures contained in the dump file to locate areas in the memory structures that contain information about the software module that was loaded when the crash occurred.

4. The method of claim 3 , wherein
the processing the memory structures includes identifying entries in a loader domain and a program manager domain.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein:
the output file includes:
source code for the software module, and
the maintenance that was previously applied to the software module.

6. A computer hardware system configured to analyze a crash in software, comprising:
a hardware processor programmed to initiate the following executable operations:
identifying, based on a dump file, a base version of a software module that was loaded when the crash occurred;
identifying, based on the dump file, maintenance that was previously applied to the software module;
identifying, based upon the base version of the software module and the maintenance that was previously applied to the software module, new corrective maintenance to be applied to the software module;
generating a list file comprising a list of entries corresponding to a plurality of software modules that were loaded when the crash occurred;
extracting, from the dump file, first failure data capture information; and
sorting the list file based upon the extracted first failure data capture information to generate an output file, wherein
the dump file is created in response to the crash.

7. The system of claim 6 , wherein the hardware processor is further programmed to initiate the following executable operations:
generating an output file including:
source code for the software module, and
the maintenance that was previously applied to the software module.

8. The system of claim 6 , wherein
the base version is identified by processing memory structures contained in the dump file to locate areas in the memory structures that contain information about the software module that was loaded when the crash occurred.

9. The system of claim 8 , wherein
the processing the memory structures includes identifying entries in a loader domain and a program manager domain.

10. The system of claim 6 , wherein:
the output file includes:
source code for the software module, and
the maintenance that was previously applied to the software module.

11. A computer program product for analyzing a crash in software, comprising:
a computer readable storage device having program code stored thereon,
the program code, which when executed by a computer hardware system, causes the computer hardware system to perform:
identifying, based on the dump file, maintenance that was previously applied to the software module;
identifying, based upon the base version of the software module and the maintenance that was previously applied to the software module, new corrective maintenance to be applied to the software module;
generating a list file comprising a list of entries corresponding to a plurality of software modules that were loaded when the crash occurred;
extracting, from the dump file, first failure data capture information; and
sorting the list file based upon the extracted first failure data capture information to generate an output file, wherein

the dump file is created in response to the crash, and
the computer readable storage device does not consist of a transitory, propagating signal.

12. The computer program product of claim 11 , wherein the hardware processor is further programmed to initiate the following executable operations:
generating an output file including:
source code for the software module, and
the maintenance that was previously applied to the software module.

13. The computer program product of claim 11 , wherein
the base version is identified by processing memory structures contained in the dump file to locate areas in the memory structures that contain information about the software module that was loaded when the crash occurred.

14. The computer program product of claim 13 , wherein
the processing the memory structures includes identifying entries in a loader domain and a program manager domain.

15. The computer program product of claim 11 , wherein:
the output file includes:
source code for the software module, and
the maintenance that was previously applied to the software module.

Assignees

• IBM

Inventors

• Smith Samuel J
• Woolley Mark A
• Wright Andrew

Classifications

• G06F11/366

  using diagnostics (G06F11/0703 takes precedence) · CPC title

• G06F11/0778

  Dumping, i.e. gathering error/state information after a fault for later diagnosis · CPC title

• G06F11/079

  Root cause analysis, i.e. error or fault diagnosis (in a hardware test environment G06F11/22; in a software test environment G06F11/36) · CPC title

• G06F11/0793

  Remedial or corrective actions (recovery from an exception in an instruction pipeline G06F9/3861; by retry G06F11/1402; for recovering from a failure of a protocol instance or entity H04L69/40) · CPC title

• G06F11/0751

  Error or fault detection not based on redundancy (power supply failures G06F1/30; network fault management H04L41/06) · CPC title