List of acronyms and initialisms: P

(Main list of acronyms and initialisms)

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p - (s) Pico
P - (s) Peta - Phosphorus

P0-9

P2P - (i) Peer-to-peer (networking)
P3I or P³I - (i) PrePlanned Product Improvement

PA

pA - (s) Picoampere
Pa - (s) Pascal - Protactinium
PA - (s) Panama (ISO 3166 digram) - Paraguay (FIPS 10-4 country code) - Pennsylvania (postal symbol) - petampere - (i) Prince Albert piercing - Public Address (vocal amplification system) - Public Affairs - PolyAmide (Nylon)
PA 6 - (s) Nylon 6 (PolyAmide) (similarly for PA 11, 12, 46, 66, 610)
PAA - (i) Position Area for Artillery
PABX - (p) Private Automated Branch eXchange (company phone system)
PAC - (i) Pan Africanist Congress - (a) Partial Solar Calibrator - Patriot Advanced Capabilities - Political Action Committee - (a/i) Primary Auditory Cortex
PACOM - (p) (U.S.) Pacific Command
PADI - (a) Professional Association of Diving Instructors
PAEK - (i) PolyArylEtherKetone
PAFC - (i) Plymouth Argyle Football Club
PAI - (i) PolyAmide Imide
PAK - (s) Pakistan (ISO 3166 trigram)
Pakistan - (p) Punjab, Afghan states, Kashmir, sIndh, baluchiSTAN
PAL - (a) Phase Alternating Line (TV standard) - (p) Philippine Airlines
PAMELA - (a) Payload for Anti-Matter Exploration and Light nuclei Astrophysics
PAN - (s) Panama (ISO 3166 trigram) - (a) Personal Area Network - (i) PolyAcryloNitrile
PANS - (a) Pretty Advanced/Awesome Network Services (cf. POTS)
PAO - (i) Public Affairs Officer
PAPI - (a) Precision Approach Path Indicator (aviation)
PARC - (a) Palo Alto Research Center
PARP - (i) (NATO Partnership for Peace) Planning And Review Process
PARWIG - (a) Power Augmented Ram Wing In Ground (aeroplane wing shape)
PAS - See entry
PASA - (i) PolyAmide, Semi-Aromatic (Nylon)
PASGT - (i) Personnel Armor System, Ground Troops
PASR - (i) Personnel Accounting and Strength Reporting
PATH - (a) Port Authority Trans-Hudson
PAWS - (a) Phased Array Warning System - Progressive Animal Welfare Society
PAYD - (a) Pay As You Drive
PAYE - (a) Pay As You Earn

PB

Pb - (s) Lead (Latin Plumbum)
PB - (i) PolyButylene
PBB - (i) PolyBrominated Biphenyl
PBCK - (i) Problem Between Chair and Keyboard (computer help desk in-joke)
PBD - (i) PolyButaDiene
PBI - (i) PolyBenzImidazole
PBN - (i) PolyButylene Naphthalate
PBS - (i) Public Broadcasting Service
PBT - (i) PolyButylene Terephthalate
PBX - (p) Private Branch eXchange (company phone system)

PC

pC - (s) picocoulomb
PC - (s) petacoulomb - U.S. Pacific Islands Trust Territory (ISO 3166 digram; obsolete 1986) - (i) Personal Computer - Player Character (roleplaying) - Politically Correct / Political Correctness - post cibum (Latin, "after meals")
PCAS - (i) Planet-Crossing Asteroid Survey
PCB - see entry
PCC - (i) NATO Partnership Coordination Cell - Posterior Cingulate Cortex - Pre-Command Course - Presidents Conference Committee
PCCB - (i) Porsche Ceramic Composite Brake
PCCIP - (i) President's Commission on Critical Infrastructure Protection
PCI - (s) U.S. Pacific Islands Trust Territory (ISO 3166 trigram; obsolete 1986) - (i) Peripheral Component Interconnect (computer bus)
PCIe - (i) Peripheral Component Interconnect Express (computer bus)
PCL - (i) Passive Coherent Location
PCMCIA - (i) Personal Computer Memory Card International Association (People Can't Memorise Computer-Industry Acronyms)
PCN - (s) Pitcairn Islands (ISO 3166 trigram)
PCP - (p) phencyclidine - PneumoCystis jiroveci Pneumonia (formerly pneumocystis carinii) - (i) Probabilistically Checkable Proof
PCR - (i) Polymerase Chain Reaction
PCZ - (s) Panama Canal Zone (ISO 3166 trigram; obsolete 1980)

PD

Pd - (s) Palladium
PD - (i) per diem (Latin: (calculated) by the day) - Point of Departure - Police Department - Postal District - Potential Difference - Principal Deputy - Public Domain
PDA - (i) Personal Digital Assistant - Predicted Drift Angle - Public Display of Affection - Push-Down Automaton
PDD - (i) Past Due Date - Presidential Decision Directive
PDF - (i) Panama^* Defense Forces (abolished 1990) - Portable Document Format - Principal Direction of Fire
PDG - (i) President Director General - Product Development Group
PDN - (i) Pull-Down Network
PDQ - (i) Pre-Defined Queries (Siebel packages) - Pretty Damn Quick
PDRY - (i) People's Democratic Republic of Yemen (obsolete since 1990)
PDT - (i) Pacific Daylight ^* Time (UTC-7 hours)
PDU - (i) Police Dog Unit - Power Distribution Unit - Protocol Data Unit

PDL - (a) Pure Dumb Luck - a texan punk band

PE

PE - (s) Ice Pellets (old style METAR Code) - Peru (ISO 3166 and FIPS 10-4 country code digram) - Prince Edward Island (postal code) - (i) Physical Education
PEBCAC - (a) Problem Exists Between Chair and Computer (IT help desk in-joke)
PEBKAC - (a) Problem Exists Between Keyboard and Chair (ditto)
PEEK - (i) PolyEtherEtherKetone
PEET - (a) Partnerships for Enhancing Expertise in Taxonomy
PEI - (i) Prince Edward Island - PolyEtherImide
PEK - (i) PolyEtherKetone
PEN - (i) PolyEthylene Naphthalate
PEO - (i) Παγκύπρια Εργατική Ομοσπονδία (Greek for "Pancyprian Federation of Labour") - Philanthropic Educational Organization - PolyEthylene Oxide - Professional Employer Organization - Professional Engineers Ontario
PEPFAR - (a) President's Emergency Plan For AIDS Relief
PER - (s) Peru (ISO 3166 trigram)
perl - (a) usually lower case Practical Extraction and Report Language
PES - (i) PolyEtherSulfone
PET - (a/i) Personal Electronic Transactor - Pierre Elliott Trudeau - Positron Emission Tomography (as in PET scan) - PolyEthylene Terephthalate (plastic) - (a) Preliminary English Test
PETA - (a/i) pentaerythritol triacrylate - People Eating Tasty Animals - People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals
PETE - (i) PolyEthyleneTErephthalate
PETP - (i) PolyEthyleneTerePhthalate

PF

pF - (s) picofarad
PF - (s) French Polynesia (ISO 3166 digram) - petafarad - (i) Phenol Formaldehyde (resin)
PFE - (i) Permanent Forest Estate
PFLAG - (p) Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays ("pee-flag")
PFO - (i) Pissed, Fell Over (medical diagnosis in-joke)
PfP - (i) Partnership for Peace

PG

pg - (s) Picogram
Pg - (s) Petagram
PG - (s) Papua New Guinea (ISO 3166 digram)
PGCE - (p) Postgraduate Certificate in Education
PGD - (i) Pre-implantation Genetic Diagnosis
PG&E - (i) Pacific Gas & Electric
PGH - (i) Pre-implantation Genetic Haplotyping
PGM - (i) Precision-Guided Munition
PGP - (i) Pretty Good Privacy

PH

pH - (s) parts of hydrogen (acidity/alkalinity index) - picohenry
PH - (i) Passive Homing (missile guidance system) - (s) petahenry - Philippines (ISO 3166 digram) - (i) Probability of Hit - Public Health - Purple Heart
PHL - (s) Philippines (ISO 3166 trigram)
PHP - (i) PHP: Hypertext Preprocessor (originally Personal Home Page (Tools))

PI

Pi - (s) Pebi
PI - (i) PolyImide - PolyIsoprene - Private Investigator
PIB - (i) PolyIsoButylene
PICS - (i) Private Investment Capital Subscription
PID - (i) Pelvic Inflammatory Disease - (p) Plan Identification Number - Positive Identification - Procedural Identification - (i) Procurement Identification Description
PIF - (a/i) Partners in Flight
PIG - (a) Pipeline Inspection Gauge
PIM - (a/i) Parameterized Ionospheric Model - Path of Intended Motion - Pediatric Index of Mortality - Personal Information Manager/Management - Presence and Interworking Mobility - Processor-In-Memory - Program Integration Manager - Protocol Independent Multicast
PIN - (a) Personal Identification Number
PINF - (i) People In Need Foundation (Czech charitable organisation)
PIPA - (a/i) Program on International Policy Attitudes
PIR - (i) Priority Intelligence Requirement
PIRA - (a) Provisional Irish Republican Army
PIREPS - (p) Pilot Reports
PITA - (a) Pain In The Ass

PJ

pJ - (s) picojoule
PJ - (s) petajoule
PJHQ - (p) Permanent Joint Headquarters
PJs - (p) Pajamas ("pee-jayz")

PK

pK - (s) picokelvin
PK - (s) Pakistan (ISO 3166 and FIPS 10-4 country code digram) - petakelvin - (i) Player Kill^* - Probability of Kill - PolyKetone
PKA - (i) Previously Known As - (i) Professionally Known As

PL

pL - (s) picolitre
PL - (s) Ice Pellets (new style METAR Code) - (s) petalitre - (i) Phase Line (Co-ordination Line) - (s) Poland (ISO 3166 and FIPS 10-4 country code digram)
PLAF - (a/i) Product Line Architecture Framework
PLAID - (p) Precision Location and Identification
PLB - (i) Personal Locator Beacon
PLC - (i) Public Limited Company (British)
PLCC - (i) Plastic Leaded Chip Carrier (electronics)
PLD - (i) Probable Line of Deployment
PLF - (i) Parachute Landing Fall
PLGR - (a) Precision Lightweight GPS Receiver ("plugger")
PLI - (i) Position Location Information - Private Lands Initiative - Professional Liability Insurance
PLL - (i) Phase-Locked Loop (electronics)
PLM - (i) Polarized Light Microscope/Microscopy
Pln - (p) Platoon
PLO - (i) Palestine Liberation Organization
PLOKTA - (a) Press Lots Of Keys To Abort
PLP - (i) Platonic Life Partner
PLS - (i) Palletized Loading System - Personal Locator System
PLUTO - (a) Pipe Line Under The Ocean
PLW - (s) Palau (ISO 3166 trigram)

PM

pm - (s) picometre
Pm - (s) petametre - Promethium
PM - (s) Panama (FIPS 10-4 country code) - (i) Perry Mason - Phase Modulation - Post Meridiem (Latin "after noon") - Prime Minister - Project Manager - (s) Saint Pierre and Miquelon (ISO 3166 digram)
PMC - (i) Primary Motor Cortex
PMCS - (i) Partial Mission Capable Supply (SM&R code) - Power Management Control System - Professional Military Comptroller School
PME - (i) Professional Military Education
PMID - (p) PubMed Identifier
PMMA - (i) PolyMethylMethAcrylate
PMOS - (i/a) P-type/Positive Metal-Oxide-Semiconductor transistor ("pee-moss")
PMSC - (i) NATO Political-Military Steering Committee on Partnership for Peace

PN

pN - (s) piconewton
PN - (s) petanewton - Pitcairn Islands (ISO 3166 digram)
PNAC - (i) Project for the New American Century
PNF - (i) Pilot Not Flying (aviation)
PNG - (s) Papua New Guinea (ISO 3166 trigram) - (i) Portable Network Graphic
PNP - (i) Partido Nuevo Progresista - Plug 'N' Play/Pray - Positive Negative Positive
PNS - (s) Pensacola, FL (IATA airport code)
PNVS - (i) Pilot Night Vision Sensor
PNH - (i) Paroxysmal nocturnal hemoglobinuria - Police Nationale d'Haïti (French, "National Police of Haiti")

PO

Po - (s) Polonium
PO - (s) Dust Devil (METAR Code) - (i) per os (Latin, "by mouth") - (s) Portugal (FIPS 10-4 country code)
pod - (a) plain old documentation
POD - (i) Port Of Debarkation
POE - (a) Perl Object Environment - (i) Port Of Embarkation
POETS - (a) Portable Occultation, Eclipse, and Transit electronic-camera System
POG - (a) Passionfruit, Orange and Guava
POI - (i) Program Of Instruction
POK - (a/i) Plane Of Knowledge
POL - (i) Petroleum, Oils and Lubricants - (s) Poland (ISO 3166 trigram)
POLAD - (p) Political Advice
POM - (i) Program Objective Memorandum - PolyOxyMethylene
POMDP - (i) Partially observable Markov decision process
POP - (a/i) Point of Presence - Post Office Protocol - Progesterone Only Pill
POR - (i) Proposed Operational Requirement
Posh - (a) see Dubious entries
POT - (a/i) Plane Of Tranquility
POTS - (a) Plain Old Telephone Service (cf. PANS) - Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome
POW - (i) Prisoner of war

PP

PP - (s) Papua New Guinea (FIPS 10-4 country code) - (i) Passage Point - per procurationem (Latin, "by proxy")
PPA - (i) PolyPhthalAmide
PPASC - (i) (U.S.) Plans and Program Analysis Support Center
PPLI - (i) Precise Participant Location & Identification
ppm - (i) Parts Per Million
PPM - (i) Parts Per Million
PPO - (i) PolyPhenylene Oxide
PPP - (i) Point-to-Point Protocol - Purchasing Power Parity
PPQ - (i) Pulses Per Quarter (used in music programming, sequencers)
PPQN - (i) Pulses Per Quarter Note (ditto)
PPQT - (i) Pre-Production Qualification Test
PPS (i) post postscriptum - Precise/Precision Positioning Service (GPS) - PolyPhenylene Sulfide

PQ

PQ - (i) Province of Québec (obsolete postal code, replaced by QC)

PR

Pr - (s) Praseodymium
PR - (i) Public Relations - (s) Puerto Rico (postal symbol; ISO 3166 digram)
PRC - (i) People's Republic of China
PRFG - (s) Partial Fog (METAR Code)
PRI - (s) Puerto Rico (ISO 3166 trigram)
PRK - (s) Democratic People's Republic of Korea (ISO 3166 trigram)
PRM - (i) Personnel Readiness Management
PRN - (i) pro re nata (Latin, "for the emergency", "as needed")
PRT - (s) Portugal (ISO 3166 trigram)
PRY - (s) Paraguay (ISO 3166 trigram)

PS

ps - (s) picosecond
pS - (s) picosiemens
Ps - (s) petasecond
PS - (s) Palestine (ISO 3166 digram) - (i) Personnel Services - (s) petasiemens - (i) post scriptum (Latin, "written after") - Power Steering - Power Supply - Public School
PSA - (i) Paralysis Society of America - Pharmaceutical Society of Australia - Pressure-Sensitive Adhesive - Production Services Association - Prostate Specific Antigen - Public Service Announcement - Public Service Association
PSC - (i) Primary Somatosensory Cortex
PSE - (s) Palestine (ISO 3166 trigram)
PSI - (a/i) Portable Source Initiative
PSO - (i) Peace Support Operations - Primary Standardisation Office (ABCA) - Protocol Supporting Organization (of the ICANN)
PSS - (i) Personnel System Support
PST - (i) Pacific Standard Time (UTC-8 hours)
PSV - (i) Philips Sport Vereniging (Dutch for "Philips Sports Union") - Public Service Vehicle
PsyOp - (p) Psychological Operations

PT

pT - (s) picotesla
Pt - (s) Platinum
PT - (s) petatesla - (i) Physical Training (in the Army) - (s) Portugal (ISO 3166 digram)
PTA - (i) Parent-Teacher Association
PTAL - (i) Public Transport Accessibility Level
PTAN - (i) Precision Terrain Aided Navigation
PTFE - (i) PolyTetraFluoroEthylene
PTL - (p) Patrol - (i) Primary Target Line
PTO - (i) Patent & Trademark Office - Please Turn Over
PTSD - (i) Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder
PTUI - (a/i) Plain-Text User Interface ("pa-too-ey") (cf CLI)

PU

Pu - (s) Plutonium
PU - (s) Guinea-Bissau (FIPS 10-4 country code) - (i) Polyurethane - (s) United States Miscellaneous Pacific Islands (ISO 3166 digram; obsolete 1986)
Pub - (p) Publication
PUG - (a/i) PET Users Group
PUN - (a/i) Pull-Up Network
PUP - (a/i) Pull-Up Point
PUS - (s) United States Miscellaneous Pacific Islands (ISO 3166 trigram; obsolete 1986)

PV

pV - (s) picovolt
PV - (s) petavolt
PVC - (i) Permanent Virtual Circuit - PolyVinyl Chloride - Premature Ventricular Contraction - Primary Visual Cortex
PvE - (i) Player versus Environment
PvP - (i) Player versus Player

PW

pW - (s) picowatt
PW - (s) Palau (postal symbol; ISO 3166 digram) - petawatt
PWA - (i) Pirates With Attitude
PWC - (i) PieceWise Constant (describing a mathematical function)
PWL - (i) PieceWise Linear (describing a mathematical function)
PWLC - (i) PieceWise Linear and Concave/Convex (describing a mathematical function)
PWP - (i) Plot, What Plot? / Porn Without Plot (denotes plotless, um, "feel-good" stories in online fiction, especially fanfic or erotic fiction)
PWR - (i) Pressurized Water Reactor

PX

PX - (p) Post eXchange

PY

PY - (s) Paraguay (ISO 3166 digram) - Person-Year - (i) Portsmouth yardstick
PYF - (s) French Polynesia (ISO 3166 trigram)

PZ

PZ - (s) Panama Canal Zone (ISO 3166 digram; obsolete 1980) - (i) Pickup Zone

Gourt Home::Gourt :: List of acronyms and initialisms: P

P0-9

PA

PB

PC

PD

PE

PF

PG

PH

PI

PJ

PK

PL

PM

PN

PO

PP

PQ

PR

PS

PT

PU

PV

PW

PX

PY

PZ

See also