For use by external devices, such as a charging station or other appliance. The sender wishes to connect a cable to a port of the indicated type (see port). The controller will respond with one of two messages:

1. If it responds with port <type> <key>, then the accessor should re-send the port-connect query to <key>, which is the actual port host responsible for managing connections. This occurs most often if the host can handle many simultaneous connections of the same type.
   
2. If it responds with port-real <type> <key>, then the accessor should accept the key provided as the particle destination and begin effects as appropriate.

If the request needs to be forwarded to a port host (the first case), then the host is guaranteed to provide a port-real message.