P

Packet switching

Transmission technique that maximizes the use of digital transmission facilities by simultaneously transmitting packets of digital data from many sources on a single communications channel. This networking technology breaks up a message into smaller pieces for transmission. It is the most common form of data transmission technology used in LANs and WANs.

Parameter block

A buffer that contains the data for one or more properties or a pointer to the data. Entries in a property table contain an offset to a property block.

Partitioned

A state in which one or more of the nodes in a cluster cannot communicate with the other cluster members.

Paused

State that applies to a node that is a fully active member in the cluster, but cannot own or run groups. The paused state is provided to allow an administrator to perform maintenance.

Pending

State that refers to a resource that is in the process of being brought online or taken offline.

Peripheral Component Interconnect (PCI)

Local bus for personal computers that provides a high-speed data path between the processor and peripheral devices.

Physical Disk resource

Disk on a SCSI bus connected to two or more nodes that contains shared folders or storage. Cluster Server provides a resource DLL for managing Physical Disk resources.

Preservation of transaction state

System design for preventing the loss of data in a transitional state.

Primary Domain Controller (PDC)

Microsoft® Windows NT® Server network operating system that manages all of the domain's user account information.

Print Spooler resource

A network printer that applications access using a network IP address rather than an individual name. Cluster Server provides a resource DLL for managing Print Spooler resources.

Property list

A collection of information used to describe multiple properties in control code operations. Each entry except the final one in a property lists contains a property name and property value. The property name contains a CLUSPROP_VALUE structure, a name string, and padding if necessary to align the name on a DWORD boundary. The property value contains a CLUSPROP_VALUE structure, data, and padding if necessary. The final entry contains only the CLUSPROP_SYNTAX_ENDMARK value.

Property table

An array of RESUTIL_PROPERTY_ITEM structures used as an input parameter to or output parameter from a Cluster Resource Utility function. Each entry in a property table contains information about a property and an offset to the property's data in a buffer known as a parameter block.

Pulling a group

Process of transferring control of all groups in a cluster to one or more alternate nodes when the current node fails. The remaining nodes negotiate for ownership of each group and when negotiation is complete, the nodes update their cluster databases.

Pushing a group

Process of restarting a group on a different node when one of its resources fail. This process can be initiated manually by an administrator, causing each of the affected resources to gracefully shutdown prior to the failover, or by the Resource Manager.