1. An information handling system, comprising: a central processing unit; system memory; a system bus which connects said central processing unit to said system memory so that said central processing unit can read data from, and write data to, said system memory; at least one peripheral bus connected to said system bus for connecting peripheral devices thereto so that said central processing unit can write data to, and read data from, said peripheral devices; said at least one peripheral bus, if more than one, being connected together in a plurality of peer and hierarchical combinations by bus-to-bus bridges, said peripheral buses that are directly connected to said system bus being primary peripheral buses and the remainder of said peripheral buses being arranged below the primary buses in various layers of a hierarchy; said primary peripheral buses each being directly connected to said system bus through a corresponding host bridge; a program stored in said system memory that said central processing unit executes to create a map of all of said peripheral buses so that the central processing unit can locate all of said peripheral devices in order to configure said peripheral devices; and said program having the capability to call a subroutine for each of said primary buses to count the number of peripheral buses in each hierarchy connected to the primary bus and to assign an identification number to each bus in said hierarchy.