Patent ID: 8402124

Claim:
A method of balancing demand for networked services in a distributed data processing system, the method comprising the steps of: initializing one or more local service managers within the distributed data processing system, wherein each local service manager has information about and provides access to networked services defined within a respective local region of the distributed data processing system for clients within the distributed data processing system, and wherein each client is uniquely associated with a local service manager; initializing one or more distributed service managers within the distributed data processing system, wherein each distributed service manager provides access to the networked services to the local service managers within the distributed data processing system, and wherein each local service manager is uniquely associated with a distributed service manager; receiving, at a distributed service manager, a request for a networked service from a local service manager for which the local service manager lacks information; determining whether the distributed service manager has information about a networked service with one or more characteristics that match one or more parameters in the request for a networked service, wherein the determining step is accomplished by reference to a cache maintained by the distributed service manager which contains information resulting from prior requests for networked services; and returning information for referencing a matched networked service.