With the Program Group Control feature, Systems Management Server can control access to shared applications to balance loads and provide fault tolerance and metering. When a user logs on to the network from any computer, a program called Program Group Control checks the local server applications database to see if the person who logged on has access to any server applications. If so, Program Group Control program builds and program groups are displayed that contain icons for the appropriate applications. If the user chooses an icon to launch a server application, Program Group Control again checks the local server applications database to see which distribution servers have the application. It connects the user to an available server and starts the application. Because Program Group Control can connect to any available distribution server, you can install the application on several servers to balance the network load and to make sure that users always have access to their network applications, even if one of the servers is down.