Patent ID: 8230122

Claim:
A method comprising: an operating system instance allocating an adapter to a first of a plurality of virtual operating system instances, wherein the plurality of virtual operating system instances run within the operating system instance, wherein the operating system instance allocating the adapter to a first virtual operating system instance comprises: the operating system instance determining that the adapter is available among a plurality of adapters allocated to the operating system instance; the operating system instance updating an entry of a second device data structure maintained by the operating system instance to indicate that the adapter is allocated to the first virtual operating system instance, wherein the entry of the second device data structure corresponds to the adapter; and supplying data from the entry of the second device data structure that corresponds to the adapter to the first virtual operating system instance; the first virtual operating system instance updating a device data structure with an entry that indicates the adapter, wherein the first virtual operating system instance maintains the device data structure; the first virtual operating system instance modifying the entry in the device data structure to associate a set of one or more endpoint storage devices with the adapter, wherein the set of endpoint storage devices are provisioned to the first virtual operating system instance; and the first virtual operating system instance configuring the set of endpoint storage devices.