v2_glp | Glossary P

Glossary - August, 2000

P

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Portable PC | Printers

Packet
- A piece of data that contains information along with the address of where the data is going on a network.

Packet Switched Network
- A digital data network containing Intelligent Switching Nodes
Page per minute (PPM)
- The speed of a printer

Page Printer
- See Printer - Page.

Palmtop computer
- Microcomputers designed to be held in the palm of your hand.

Parallel Communications
- Moving a bytes of data across several parallel wires.

Parallel Data Communications
- Internally, a computer moves data in a parallel manner on a Bus, the number of parallel paths is known as Bus Width. All bits are transferred over the data bus at the same time. ie a separate path for each bit.

Parallel Importing
- the commercial importing of copyright material by other than the authorised distributor.

Parity bit
- An extra bit attached to a byte, character or word that is used to detect errors in transmission.

Pascal
- A structured computer programming language designed to teach good programming practices.

PC (Personal Computer)
- See Microcomputer.

PC Card (PCMCIA card)
- A card that plugs into a standard PC slot and provides additional capabilities for a portable system
PCL
- Refer to Printer command language

PCMCIA connector
- See Personal Computer Memory Card International Association

PDA (Personal Digital Assistant)
- See Pen-based computer.

Pedantic
- Another useful word for social occasions!. Means strict adherence to formal rules.

Pen-based computer
- A microcomputer where user's write directly on the screen.

People
- One of the five basic components of a computer system. People who use the computers are classified as end-users (or just users)

PERL
- (Internet WWW) A scripting language used widely on Internet and Unix-based servers. It contains most of the control structures and conceptual underpinnings of every major programming language.

Personal Computer
- See Microcomputer.

Personal Computer Memory Card International Association (PCMCIA)
- A credit-card type connector becoming increasingly popular, mainly on portable PC's but more recently on desktop PC's.
- Alternative definition: "People can't Memorise Computer Industry Acronyms"!!

Personal Digital Assistant (PDA)
- See Pen-based computer.
Perspective correction (3D graphics)
- Process by which textures are adjusted to compensate for changes in the viewers location.

PERT chart
- (Project management) Project Evaluation and Review Techniques, which displays tasks and dependencies, includes a time scale. <SWAS>

Phase Modulation
- phase of waves is changed. (Analog Mode)

Physical Data Organisation
- is how the COMPUTER stores the data.
Pincushioning
- When an image on the screen bulges at the left and right edges, or is a little wider at the top than at the bottom. Monitors will often have controls to fix this.

Piracy (Software)
- If you copy software without the copyright owners permission.

Plain old telephone services (POTS)
- The standard telephone service.Also called Public switch telephone network.

Plotter
- Flat bed type with 2 dimensional movement of the pen or drum type with 1 dimensional pen movement and rotation of drum.

PMBOK
- See Project Management Body of Knowledge
Point aggregation (GIS)
- The collection of points within a defined region. For example, the cities in a state.
Point to point tunnelling protocol (PPTP)
- A way to encode information for transmission across networks that use the internet protocol. Originally designed to let remote users dial into a network, it is also used to connect one local network to another via the Internet in a system known as a Virtual Private network.
Polygon throughput (3D-graphics)
- 3D objects are composed of polygons - usually triangles. The greater the number of polygons the clearer the image. A higher polygon throughput means faster rendering.
Polyline smoothing (GIS)
- Smooths intersecting lines into curves

Polymorphic viruses
- alter their appearance with each infection, making it harder to detect them.

Portable Personal Computer
- Battery powered personal computer designed to be moved around. Include Personal digital assistants (Palm tops and subnotebooks) and Laptops.
POST, GET
- (Internet WWW) Two methods of submitting information from a browser to a server. GET uses only environment variables; POST sends contents of forms via standard input, reducing the complexity of the actual server submission. Hits" on a Web site are the number of individual GET and POST requests, one of which is generated for every transaction.
Postscript
- Page description language developed by Adobe System and has been a standard in commercial publishing.

POTS
- See Plain old telephone services

Power problems
- see surges, sags, spikes, noise harmonics, blackouts.
PPM
- Refer to: Page per minute.

PPTP
- Refer to: Point to point tunnelling protocol

Primary Storage (Memory)
- Temporarily holds data and program instructions for processing the data.

Printer
- An output device used to produce hardcopy.

Printer - bubblejet
- Characters and graphics are printed by firing ink droplets at the paper from thin nozzles.

Printer - Character
- A printer that prints one character at a time.

Printer Classification
- printers are classified by Print Method, Impact or Non-impact, Dot Matrix or shaped , high or low speed.
Printer command language (PCL)
- A command set developed by Hewlett-Packard for describing how a laser printer is to draw a page.

Printer Controls
- buttons on the printer enabling you to set options (for example; Online, Form Feed).

Printer - Dot matrix
- A low speed printer that uses a row of pins hammering a ribbon to produce characters.

Printer - Daisy wheel
- exchangeable print heads which look like 60 mm diameter spoked rimless wheels, with individual characters located sideways on the end of each spoke.

Printer - -impact
- A printer that uses hammering mechanism as a means of forming a character image on the paper.

Printer - - Inkjet
- non-impact character matrix printers which fire ink droplets onto the paper by using an 'electrostatic field'.

Printer - - Laser
- A non-impact dot matrix printers using a process similar to that used by a photocopy machine is used to form a page image on a drum

Printer - Line
- A printer that prints a line at a time.

Printer - Non-impact
- A printer that uses a Thermal, electrostatic, light or ink jet means of forming a character image on the paper.

Printer - Page
- A printer that prints a page at a time.

Printer - Thermal
- these are non-impact character matrix printers which print onto special paper using a heated print head.

Project
- (Project management) A temporary process, carried out in steps, that creates a product or service. <SWAS>

Project Evaluation and Review Techniques
- see PERT chart

Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK)
- Rules promoted by the Project Management Institute. <SWAS>
Projection (GIS)
- Mathematical formulae for laying the curved surface of the earth flat.

Privacy
- Privacy is the expectation that people have about the storage and use of personal information.

Procedures
- One of the five basic components of a computer system. The instructions that tell US what to do (Procedures ==> People)

Processed Data
- data that is changed by the computer.

Processing Hardware
- manipulating the data and instructions within the computer. Eg. Intel 80486 Central Processing Unit (CPU)

Project Management Software
- plan, schedule and control people, resources and costs of projects.

Projector
- An output device that enables a computers video output to be projected onto a large screen.

Protocol
- rules for exchanging data

Proxy server
- A server that resides between the client and the server, that monitors and filters traffic travelling between them. It also boosts web response time by locally storing copies of frequently accessed web pages.