Sophisticated Circuits, Inc.

Richard Elmore

Jonathan Jay Feinstein

Amar Singh

A method and an apparatus for controlling the operation of a digital processing system. In one example of a method of the invention, a first status indicator is received for a first software program which is executing on the digital processing system, and it is determined whether the first software program is in a first state. In response to determining that the first software program is not in the first state, then a first predetermined function is performed. In one embodiment, several additional status indicators may be received, one for each of several software programs which are executing on the system. For each additional status indicator, it is determined whether the corresponding software program is in the first state, and if it is not in the first state, then a corresponding, predetermined function is performed, such as (for example) relaunching the corresponding software. In one particular embodiment, the first status indicator, which indicates the first software program is not in a fault state, is provided by the first software program to another software program which is also executing on the system. In this particular embodiment, the first status indicator resets a counter which corresponds to the first software program and which is controlled by the another software program. The another software program determines the first software is in a fault state by examining a value of the counter.

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Kirkland, WA, United States of America

Richard Elmore