Portals in fiction

A portal in science fiction and fantasy is a technological or magical doorway that connects two distant locations separated by spacetime. It usually consists of two or more gateways, with an object entering one gateway leaving via the other instantaneously.

Places linked by a portal include a different spot in the same universe (in which case it might be an alternative for teleportation); a parallel world (inter-dimensional portal); the past or the future (time portal); and other planes of existence, such as heaven, hell or other afterworlds. A parallel world, such as C. S. Lewis's Wood between the Worlds in his Chronicles of Narnia, may exist solely to contain multiple portals, perhaps to every parallel world in existence.

Portals are similar to the cosmological concept of a wormhole, and some portals work using wormholes.

Use

Portals are often used in science fiction to move protagonists into new territory. In video games the concept is often used to allow the player to cover territory that has already been explored very quickly. A related book plot that is commonly used is the struggle to get to the opposite end of a new gate for the first time, before it can be used.

Portal

Portal may refer to:

Computing

Gateways to information

Other

Entertainment

Web portal

A web portal is most often one specially designed web site that brings information together from diverse sources in a uniform way. Usually, each information source gets its dedicated area on the page for displaying information (a portlet); often, the user can configure which ones to display. Variants of portals include mashups and intranet "dashboards" for executives and managers. The extent to which content is displayed in a "uniform way" may depend on the intended user and the intended purpose, as well as the diversity of the content. Very often design emphasis is on a certain "metaphor" for configuring and customizing the presentation of the content and the chosen implementation framework and/or code libraries. In addition, the role of the user in an organization may determine which content can be added to the portal or deleted from the portal configuration.

A portal may use a search engine API to permit users to search intranet content as opposed to extranet content by restricting which domains may be searched. Apart from this common search engines feature, web portals may offer other services such as e-mail, news, stock quotes, information from databases and even entertainment content. Portals provide a way for enterprises and organizations to provide a consistent look and feel with access control and procedures for multiple applications and databases, which otherwise would have been different web entities at various URLs. The features available may be restricted by whether access is by an authorized and authenticated user (employee,member) or an anonymous site visitor.

Portal (interactive novel)

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 DOS were later released. Versions for the 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 game Portal (2007) by Valve Corporation.

Setting

The player, taking on the role of the unnamed astronaut protagonist, returns from a failed 100-year voyage to 61 Cygni to find the Earth devoid of humans. Cars are rusted and covered with moss, the streets are completely barren and everything appears as though the entire human race had just vanished suddenly. The player happens upon a barely functioning computer terminal that is tied into a storytelling mainframe, Homer. Through this interface, the player, assisted by Homer who attempts to weave the information into a coherent narrative, discovers information in order to piece together the occurrences leading to the disappearance of the human race. For instance, spending some time in the Medical Records section may unlock a piece of data in the Science section, and through these links the player can finish the game.