Patent ID: 8438566

Claim:
A data processing system comprising: at least one processor comprising multiple logical partitions, the multiple logical partitions requiring multiple partition services; and wherein the at least one processor further comprises a virtual input/output server (VIOS) partition comprising at least one virtual input/output (VIO) adapter, the at least one VIO adapter interfacing the VIOS partition to a hypervisor of the data processing system, and wherein the VIOS partition manages assignment of a partition service to a particular VIO adapter by: determining a partition priority number for the new partition service; summing, for each VIO adapter of the at least one VIO adapter, partition priority numbers of partition services currently assigned to that VIO adapter; automatically determining, for a VIO adapter with a lowest sum of partition priority numbers, whether assigning the new partition service to that VIO adapter will move its sum of partition priority numbers above a predefined threshold; and automatically assigning the new partition service to a VIO adapter of the data processing system based, at least in part, on whether assigning the new partition service to the VIO adapter with the lowest sum of partition priority numbers will move that VIO adapter's summed partition priority number above the predefined threshold.