Progressive User Interfaces for Regressive Analysis: Making Tracks with Large, Low-Level Systems

Baldwin, J., Sinha, P., Salois, M. and Coady, Y.

Comprehension of low-level issues, such as malware threats, often relies on dated user interfaces that actually inhibit navigation and exploration of large code bases. These user interfaces often fail to exploit visualization techniques that could significantly alleviate cognitive overhead. An initial usability survey reveals that better and easier analysis of control flow is particularly critical for malware program comprehension. By developing tools that couple high-level views of control flow relationships with more detailed views of call sequences, we demonstrate how improved user interfaces can leverage visualization techniques. These tools go beyond the ubiquitous call graph and have the ability to scale in ways that promote their use for comprehending large, complex systems.

Cite as: Baldwin, J., Sinha, P., Salois, M. and Coady, Y. (2011). Progressive User Interfaces for Regressive Analysis: Making Tracks with Large, Low-Level Systems. In Proc. Australasian User Interface Conference (AUIC 2011) Perth, Australia. CRPIT, 117. Christof Lutteroth and Haifeng Shen Eds., ACS. 47-56

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