In distributed computing, the problem of assigning a set of processes to a set of processors is complex.

Consider we are running a program P = {p1, ..., pn} with n processes. We know the cost Xi of running each process pi on processor X, and the cost Yi, of running each process pi on processor Yi.

Consider, additionally, the communication cost Cij between processes pi e pj if i != j. There are no communication cost between two processes running on the same processor.

The given algorithm minimizes the total execution cost of program P by utilizing graphs and the Ford-Fulkerson algorithm.