Patent ID: 8893131

Claim:
A method comprising: identifying a plurality of partitions on a first storage server, wherein at least some partitions of the plurality of partitions includes a set of existing records; identifying a set of new records to be inserted into at least one partition of the plurality of partitions; in response to determining the first storage server is in an overfull state, said determining being based at least in part on the identified set of new records exceeding an insert limit, said insert limit being based at least in part on a maximum permissible number of records the plurality of partitions is capable to receive, determining an insertion cost for inserting a portion of said set of new records into respective partitions of the plurality of partitions, wherein said insertion cost is based, at least in part, on a number of new records within the portion of said set of new records to be inserted into the respective partitions of the plurality of partitions; for each of the respective partitions of the plurality of partitions, determining a move cost based, at least in part, on a number of records in each of the respective partitions of the set of existing records; selecting a first partition of the respective partitions of the plurality of partitions for transition to a second storage server based, at least in part, on a ratio of said move cost associated with the first partition of the respective partitions of the plurality of partitions to said insertion cost associated with the first partition of the respective partitions of the plurality of partitions; and transitioning the set of existing records of the selected first partition to the second storage server identified as an underfull storage server.