One of the challenges in real time systems, especially in multitasking OS based implementations, is defect fixing. To resolve the defect one has to be aware of the program flow during the defect or faulty condition. Normally, this is done by using in-circuit emulators (ICE) along with the break point feature available in the environment of the emulator.
However, the ICE support may not always be available for the system under consideration. Considering the case that ICE is available for the system under consideration, and the ICE hits a breakpoint, then the dynamics of the system is lost.
All the interactions the system was having with some networks or other systems/modules are stopped at once. Therefore it again may be difficult to reproduce the defect or anomaly exactly. Though some makes of ICE provides a feature of real-time trace function, but that is also limited by the ICE memory.
At times it is required to stop the system in some logical trigger, so that the condition of the system can be analyzed at that point. This feature is also not common in normal debugging systems.

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