The Free On-line Dictionary of Computing (30 December 2018):
partitioned data set
(PDS) A data set on an IBM mainframe that
contains members, each of which acts like a separate data set.
Partitioned data sets are more space-efficient than individual
data sets, because they can put more than one data set on a
track. They are also used to hold libraries, with one
function per member. The syntax for a member is
NAME.OF.PDS(MEMBER) although some systems (such as Phoenix)
could use NAME.OF.PDS:MEMBER
Original PDSes were of fixed size, and needed frequent
compression to recover space after deleting or changing
members. Newer PDS/E Extended PDSes do not have this problem.
(2003-12-05)