For one part of the final project for a business class that I'm taking, I have to define a list of eCommerce vocabulary terms. Two of the terms are "portal sites" and "portals." I have looked on www.webopedia.com and www.netlingo.com and both sites show them as the same word. What is the difference?

Check out these links,
It is as you say more confusing the harder you look at it

Portal:
Usually used as a marketing term to described a Web site that is or is intended to be the first place people see when using the Web. Typically a "Portal site" has a catalog of web sites, a search engine, or both. A Portal site may also offer email and other service to entice people to use that site as their main "point of entry" (hence "portal") to the Web

http://www.marketingterms.com/dictionary/portal/

http://www.mariosalexandrou.com/glossary/web_portal.asp

http://www.dla.mil/jgwi/definition_for_portal.htm

Thanks, bedstor!

The portal is the main point of entry and the portal site is the web site that makes up the point of entry. It probably should have been included in the same entry for definitions.

Examples of portals:
http://www.yahoo.com
http://www.lycos.co.uk
http://home.netscape.com