Systems and methods are provided to track cluster nodes and provide high availability in a computing system. A computer system includes hosts, a cluster manager, and a cluster database. The cluster database includes entries corresponding to the hosts which identify the physical location of a corresponding host. The cluster manager uses the data to select at least two hosts and assign the selected hosts to a service group for executing an application. The cluster manager selects hosts via an algorithm that determines which hosts are least likely to share a single point of failure. The data includes a hierarchical group of location attributes describing two or more of a host's country, state, city, building, room, enclosure, and radio frequency identifier (RFID). The location-based algorithm identifies a group of selected hosts whose smallest shared location attribute is highest in the hierarchical group. The system updates the data whenever a physical location of a host changes.