Patent ID: 7924829

Claim:
A computer implemented method for enabling network statistics to be collected per software partition, the computer implemented method comprising: responsive to receiving an incoming data packet at an Internet Protocol layer of an operating system, identifying, using a processor, an Internet Protocol address in the incoming data packet; comparing the Internet Protocol address in the incoming data packet against Internet Protocol addresses stored in a hash table, wherein the hash table maps each Internet Protocol address in the hash table to a software partition of the operating system, wherein the operating system comprises a separate software partition data structure corresponding to each software partition from among a plurality of software partitions; responsive to locating an Internet Protocol address in the hash table that matches the Internet Protocol address in the data packet, identifying the software partition mapped to the located Internet Protocol address from among the plurality of software partitions; responsive to identifying the software partition mapped to the located Internet Protocol address, inserting a tag comprising the identifier of the software partition in an unused section of the network packet header for the incoming data packet at the Internet Protocol layer of a protocol stack; using the tag to indicate to all upstream methods at the transport layer and application layer of the protocol stack that the incoming data packet belongs to the software partition; and associating network statistics collected for the incoming data packet at the Internet Protocol layer with the software partition in the particular software partition data structure associated with the software partition.