A method and apparatus for processing a computing job in a distributed processing system. A control process sends a message to an instance of an application instructing the application instance to divide the job into assignments for processing by various application instances. The application instance divides the job in a way that is suitable for the particular application and sends, to the control process, assignment information that describes how the job is to be divided. The control process stores the assignment information and assigns each of the application instances a portion of the computing job based on the assignment information. After, the application instances have completed the assignments, the control process instructs one of the application instances to perform post-processing on the assignment results, based on the assignment information.