What is "portal"

Portal \Por"tal\, n. [OF. portal, F. portail, LL. portale, fr. L. porta a gate. See Port a gate.]

1. A door or gate; hence, a way of entrance or exit, especially one that is grand and imposing.

   Thick with sparkling orient gems The portal shone.
   --Milton.

   From out the fiery portal of the east.
   --Shak.

2. (Arch.)

   1. The lesser gate, where there are two of different dimensions.

   2. Formerly, a small square corner in a room separated from the rest of the apartment by wainscoting, forming a short passage to another apartment.

   3. By analogy with the French portail, used by recent writers for the whole architectural composition which surrounds and includes the doorways and porches of a church.

3. (Bridge Building) The space, at one end, between opposite trusses when these are terminated by inclined braces.

4. A prayer book or breviary; a portass. [Obs.]

   Portal bracing (Bridge Building), a combination of struts and ties which lie in the plane of the inclined braces at a portal, serving to transfer wind pressure from the upper parts of the trusses to an abutment or pier of the bridge.

Portal \Por"tal\, a. (Anat.) Of or pertaining to a porta, especially the porta of the liver; as, the portal vein, which enters the liver at the porta, and divides into capillaries after the manner of an artery.

Note: Portal is applied to other veins which break up into capillaries; as, the renal portal veins in the frog.

late 14c., "gate, gateway," from Old French portal "gate" (Modern French portail) and directly from Medieval Latin portale "city gate, porch," from neuter of portalis (adj.) "of a gate," from Latin porta "gate" (see port (n.1)).

a. (context anatomy English) Of or relating to a porta, especially the porta of the liver. n. 1 A grandiose and often lavish entrance. 2 An entrance, entry point, or means of entry. 3 (context Internet English) A website that acts as an entrance to other websites on the Internet. 4 (context anatomy English) A short vein that carries blood into the liver. 5 (context fiction English) A magical or technological (l/en: doorway) leading to another location, period in time or dimension. 6 (context architecture English) A lesser gate, where there are two of different dimensions. 7 (context architecture English) Formerly, a small square corner in a room separated from the rest of an apartment by wainscoting, forming a short passage to another apartment. 8 (context bridge-building English) The space, at one end, between opposite trusses when these are terminated by inclined braces. 9 A prayer book or breviary; a portass.

1. n. a grand and imposing entrance (often extended metaphorically); "the portals of the cathedral"; "the portals of heaven"; "the portals of success"

2. a site that the owner positions as an entrance to other sites on the internet; "a portal typically has search engines and free email and chat rooms etc." [syn: portal site]

3. a short vein that carries blood into the liver [syn: portal vein, hepatic portal vein, vena portae]

Portal may refer to:

• Portal (architecture), a monumental gate or door, or the extremities (ends) of a tunnel
• Portals in fiction, magical or technological doorways that connect two locations, dimensions, or points in time

Portal is a TV show that aired on G4. During its two-season run from 2002–2004, it was one of the most popular shows on the network. Written, produced, and hosted by Dave Meinstein, Portal was in many ways a comedy, a soap opera, a sketch comedy show, and a news show. It was an attempt at a new type of show by blending satire, stylistic elements, and various levels of dramatism. Portal was the first television series to use machinima.

Portal is a mix between a computerized novel and an interactive game. It was published for the Amiga in 1986 by Activision, written by Rob Swigart, produced by Brad Fregger, and programmed by Nexa Corporation. Versions for the Commodore 64, Apple II, and MS-DOS were later released. Versions for the Apple Macintosh and Atari ST were announced and developed, but never formally released. A unique game for its time, Portal was one part text-driven adventure (à la Zork or Planetfall) but with a graphical interface. It is unrelated to the 2007 game of the same name by Valve Corporation.

Portal is the name given to the three Magic: The Gathering starter level sets. The original Portal. was released on May 1, 1997, followed by Portal Second Age on June 24, 1998 and Portal Three Kingdoms on July 6, 1999. The Portal set was inspired by Chinese mythology; Three Kingdoms in particular by Chinese historical novel Romance of the Three Kingdoms by Luo Guanzhong.

A portal is an opening in a wall of a building, gate or fortification, especially a grand entrance to an important structure. Doors, metal gates, or portcullis in the opening can be used to control entry or exit. The surface surrounding the opening may be made of simple building materials or decorated with ornamentation. The elements of a portal can include the voussoir, tympanum, an ornamented mullion or trumeau between doors, and columns with carvings of saints in the westwork of a church.

Portal (Charles Little Sky) is a fictional character, a mutant superhero appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics.

"Portal" is a magic trick performed by the illusionist David Copperfield, in which he takes a member of the audience and transports both of them to a pre-selected location (Hawaii, The Hoover Dam, Australia), before reappearing on stage. This effect has been performed in David Copperfield's show since 2001. Portal was out of the show in the summer of 2007, returned in the winter of 2007, left in the spring of 2008, and hasn't been performed since.

Portal is the debut album of Windy & Carl, self-released in November, 1994.

Portal is a 2007 first-person puzzle-platform video game developed by Valve Corporation, released in a bundle package called The Orange Box for Microsoft Windows via its digital distribution service Steam and Xbox 360 on October 9, 2007, the PlayStation 3 on December 11, 2007, OS X on the Mac-compatible Steam platform on May 12, 2010, a Linux version on Steam as a beta on May 2, 2013 and released on June 24, 2013, and for Android as a port for the Nvidia Shield on May 12, 2014.

The game consists primarily of a series of puzzles that must be solved by teleporting the player's character and simple objects using "the Aperture Science Handheld Portal Device", a device that can create inter-spatial portals between two flat planes. The player-character, Chell, is challenged and taunted by an artificial intelligence named GLaDOS (Genetic Lifeform and Disk Operating System) to complete each puzzle in the Aperture Science Enrichment Center using the portal gun with the promise of receiving cake when all the puzzles are completed. The game's unique physics allows momentum to be retained through portals, requiring creative use of portals to maneuver through the test chambers. This gameplay element is based on a similar concept from the game Narbacular Drop; many of the team members from the DigiPen Institute of Technology who worked on Narbacular Drop were hired by Valve for the creation of Portal, making it a spiritual successor to the game.

Portal was acclaimed as one of the most original games of 2007, despite being considered for its short duration and limited story. The game received praise for its originality, unique gameplay and dark story with a humorous series of dialogue. GLaDOS, voiced by Ellen McLain in the English-language version, received acclaim for her unique characterization, and the end credits song " Still Alive", written by Jonathan Coulton for the game, was acclaimed for its original composition and humorous twist. Excluding Steam download sales, over four million copies of the game have been sold since its release, spawning official merchandise from Valve including plush Companion Cubes, as well as fan recreations of the cake and portal gun, a standalone version, Portal: Still Alive, on the Xbox Live Arcade service on October 22, 2008, which added an additional 14 puzzles to the gameplay, and a sequel, Portal 2, which was released in 2011, adding several new gameplay mechanics and a cooperative multiplayer mode.

Portal is an Australian extreme metal band whose style is an unorthodox fusion of death metal with black metal. The band's hybrid musical style is characterised by heavily distorted guitar riffs, down-tuned rhythms, and vocals ranging from "menacing, echoing" sound effects to guttural grunts. Writing for Popmatters, Adrien Begrand noted that "death metal always pretends to be scary, but [...] it's all rather harmless. That said, however, I make no mistake in saying that the death metal peddled by Australia’s Portal is truly friggin' terrifying". Lead guitarist Horror Illogium has described Portal's intent as "to capture a cinematic horror scope".

Portal is a series of first-person puzzle-platform video games developed by Valve Corporation. Set in the Half-Life universe, the two games in the series, Portal (2007) and Portal 2 (2011), center on a woman, Chell, forced to undergo a series of tests within the Aperture Science Enrichment Center by a malicious artificial intelligence computer, GLaDOS, that controls the facility. Each test involves using the "Aperture Science Handheld Portal Device" - the "portal gun" - that creates a human-sized wormhole-like connection between nearly any two flat surfaces. The player-character or objects in the game world may move through portals, their momentum conserved. This allows complex "flinging" maneuvers to be used to cross wide gaps or perform other feats to reach the exit for each test chamber. A number of other mechanics, such as lasers, light bridges, tractor funnels, and turrets, exist to aid or hinder the player's goal to reach the exit.

The Portal games are noted for bringing students and their projects from the DigiPen Institute of Technology into Valve and extend their ideas into the full games. The portal concept was introduced by the game Narbacular Drop and led to the basis for the first game. Another game, Tag: The Power of Paint, formed the basis of surface-altering "gels" introduced in Portal 2.

Both games have received near-universal praise, and have sold millions of copies. The first game was released as part of a three-game compilation, The Orange Box, and though intended as a short bonus feature of the compilation, was instead considered the highlight of the three. Its success led to the creation of the much longer Portal 2, which included both single player and cooperative player modes; it too received mostly positive critical reviews. In addition to the challenging puzzle elements, both games are praised for its dark humor, written by Erik Wolpaw, Chet Faliszek, and Jay Pinkerton, voice work by actors Ellen McLain, Stephen Merchant, and J.K. Simmons, and musical songs by Jonathan Coulton. A number of spin-off media have been developed alongside the games, and several of the game elements have become parts of Internet memes.