Patent ID: 8141093

Claim:
A method, in a data processing system, for managing input/output (I/O) virtualization, comprising: creating one or more client partitions in the data processing system, each client partition having an associated portion of resources of the data processing system; creating, in the data processing system, an I/O virtualization management partition (IMP), wherein the IMP performs I/O virtualization management operations with an I/O endpoint of the data processing system to thereby manage set of physical functions, comprising one or more physical functions of the I/O endpoint and wherein each client partition in the one or more client partitions is not permitted to perform I/O virtualization management operations on the set of physical functions but is permitted to perform I/O virtualization management operations on one or more virtual functions in the I/O endpoint that are associated with the client partition; creating at least one communication structure for communicating between the IMP and the one or more client partitions; and performing, by the IMP, the I/O virtualization management operations with the I/O endpoint using the at least one communication structure.