The spi_trace process can run a Stochastic Pi Calculus (spifcp) process
and trace its behavior.

   spi_trace#run(<call program>, <file_name>, <time limit>)
or
   spi_trace#run(<call program>, <file_name>, <time limit>, <scale>)
or
   spi_trace#run(<call program>, <file_name>, <time limit>, <format>)
or
   spi_trace#run(<call program>, <file_name>, <time limit>, <format>, <scale>)
or
   spi_trace#run(<call program>, <file_name>, <time limit>, <scale>, <format>)


The time limit forces termination of the run, after that much internal
time has elapsed.  If the run terminates before the the time limit is
reached, you will usually want to abort the run (enter: abort<cr>).

When the internal times are very small, or very large, you can scale 
the output - this does not effect process behavior.

You may also format the output, which is written to the named file,
specifying one of the strings:

   none, process, creator, full

The default is "none".  The others add information to the formatted
output.

You may also use the macros:

    trace(<quantified process set>, <file_name>, <time limit>)
or
    trace(<quantified process set>, <file_name>, <time limit>, <scale>)
or
    trace(<quantified process set>, <file_name>, <time limit>, <format>)
or
    trace(<quantified process set>, <file_name>, <time limit>,
           <scale>, <format>)
or
    trace(<quantified process set>, <file_name>, <time limit>,
           <format>, <scale>)

See repeat.txt for the definitition of <quantified process set>.

Examples:

1. trace(hysteresis#MODULE, fff, 100)

   starts the process  MODULE  in program module  hysteresis  and
   terminates the run after 100 time units have elapsed.  To 
   terminate the run prematurely, suspend the Logix computation
   or enter  <control>C  to kill the Logix system; it traces the
   events of the run on file fff.

2. trace(hysteresis#MODULE, fff, 100, 10)

   does the same thing, and traces the events of the run on file 
   fff with time values scaled times 10.

3. trace(hysteresis#MODULE, fff, 100, creator)

   does the same thing as 1, tracing to fff with annotations
   indicating which channels transmitted messages.

The elements of the file are lines which have one of three forms.

   a. A positive real-valued time.

   b. +<process signature>, which traces the start of a procedure.

   c. -<process signature>, which traces the termination of a procedure.

A process signature is the name of a process instance and its channel
identifiers in functional format.  Channels which have been closed
are wrapped in square brackets.

Annotation appears on c lines:

1. The "process" format includes an arrow, indicating whether the
   process sent (->) or received (<-) a message, followed by the name
   within the process of the channel which transmitted the message.

2. The "creator" format is similar, but with the created identifier of
   the channel instead of its name - this includes a unique index for
   each instance of a local channel.

3. The "full" format is similar, providing both the name and the created
   identifier,  separated by a colon (:).

The output of trace is very similar to the output of record (see
record.txt); the trace annotations include spaces around their
separators.  However, tracing is an much slower than recording, due
to the overhead of producing the process signature.


You may start tracing at any time from the console or
dynamically from a program, for example, while running
a program, enter or call:

   spi_trace#trace(screen#display(hi),xxx,1000)


This document is licensed under Gnu General Public License - Version 3

    http://www.nongnu.org/efcp/gnu-gpl3.html