P here stands for plug not pin. Socket and plug
refer to the shell. Ma=
le
and Female refer to the contacts. You can have female contacts in a plug =
or
socket and you can have male contacts in a plug or socket. A good example
of all FOUR combinations are the DB 25 connectors (and their mating
connectors) used for the parallel and serial ports on the >>ORIGINAL<< IB=
M
PC and PC XT.
I beg to disagree. In both of those cases you have a -P shell with male
(pin) contacts (fixed to the RS232 card, free on the end of the parallel
cable) and a -S shell fitted with female (socket) contacts (free on the
end of the RS232 cable, fixed to the parallel card).
In the case of D-series connectors, I don't think it's possible to fit
female contacts to a -P shell or male contacts to a -S shell. It is
possible to do that with some other types of connectors, of course.
In the UK, the term 'plug' refers to the connector with male contacts and
'sosket' to the connector with female contacts no matter whether they're
on the end of the cable ('free') or on a panel ('fixed'). Problems start
when youy have a connector with a mixture of contact types...
-tony