The different ypes of patches are described by Symantec as:
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Patch (P), point patch (PP), or hot fix (HF)
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A fix for a specific package in one product release on a single platform.
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Service pack (SP)
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A collection of multiple individual patches, point patches, and hot fixes. A service pack applies to packages across the entire product on all platforms.
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Rolling patch (RP)
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A collection of multiple individual patches, point patches, and hot fixes. A rolling patch applies to packages across the entire product on a single platform.
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Maintenance pack (MP)
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A full product release that includes all previously released patches, point patches, hot fixes, and rolling patches. A maintenance pack may also contain support for new platform versions.
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As MP, RP & SP contain multiple patches you should generally keep up to date with these. It is my understanding that P, PP and HF are tested less than MP, RP & SP and so you should only apply these if the issue described by the patch could effect your configuration. If the date of the P, PP and HF is before the date of the MP, RP & SP, then in theory it should be included, but if the dates are close I would check P, PP and HF desc to see what versions it applies to. The product column is a bit misleading as I notice above that for P-Patches it says VPI 5.1, but the patch name is 5.x (not 5.1) and looking at the patch on SORT it does indeed apply to 5.0. The VPI 4.2 also applies to 4.2 and 4.3 (but not 5.x).
P-Patches are often quite major, as in the case with the VPI 5.1 above, so you should apply. If you look at HF 13, then this is to fix a specific error so only apply if you need to.
Mike
Zahid_Haseeb
