Patent ID: 8826278

Claim:
A method of managing host physical memory using a balloon application executing within a guest virtual machine running on a host platform, the method comprising: receiving, by the balloon application, allocation parameters from an entity outside a context of the guest virtual machine, the allocation parameters identifying an amount of memory for the balloon application to allocate; increasing, according to the allocation parameters, an allocated amount of memory provided by a guest operating system executing within the guest virtual machine to the balloon application; writing a predetermined value to physical memory that is mapped to a page of newly allocated memory described by a guest virtual page number when the allocated amount of memory is increased, the predetermined value enabling the physical memory and the page of newly allocated memory to be identified as being allocated to the balloon application and eligible for page sharing; and enabling the physical memory that includes the predetermined value to be mapped to the page of newly allocated memory and a second page of memory allocated by the balloon application.