P

pathname

in Windows operating environments, a specification of a drive, directories, and subdirectories, such as C:\SAS\SASUSER.

permanent SAS data library

a SAS library that is not deleted when a SAS session ends, and which is therefore available to subsequent SAS sessions. Unless the USER libref is defined, you use a two-level name to access a file in a permanent library. The first-level name is the libref, and the second-level name is the member name. See also libref (library reference), member.

physical filename

the name that the operating system uses to identify a file.

pipe

an object that provides direct access to STDIN, STDOUT, and STDERR between processes. Pipe is synonymous with unnamed pipe. See also named pipe.

pop-up menu

a menu that appears when it is requested . These menus are context-specific, depending on which window is active and on the cursor location. See also pull-down menu.

portability

the ability of a program to execute in an operating environment other than the one for which it was written.

portable

See portability.

procedure output file

an external file that contains the result of the analysis that a SAS procedure performs or the report that the procedure produces. Most SAS procedures write output to the procedure output file by default. Reports that are produced by SAS DATA steps, using PUT statements and a FILE statement along with a PRINT destination, also go to this file. See also external file, DATA step.

process

a functional unit of a program or task.

process ID ( PID )

a unique number that is assigned to each process by the operating system.

Profile catalog

See Sasuser.Profile catalog.

pull-down menu

the list of menu items or choices that appears when you choose an item from a menu bar or from another menu.