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=== From documents and files to Web resources ===
===From Web resources to abstract resources===
The first explicit definition of resource is found in RFC 2396, in August 1998 :
''A resource can be anything that has identity. Familiar examples include an electronic document, an image, a service (e.g., "today's weather report for Los Angeles"), and a collection of other resources. Not all resources are network "retrievable"; e.g., human beings, corporations, and bound books in a library can also be considered resources.''
If examples in this document are still limited to physical entities, the definition opens the door to more abstract resources. Providing a concept is given an identity, and this identity is expressed by a well-formed URI, then a concept can be a resource as well.
In January 2005, RFC 3986 makes this extension of the definition completely explicit:
''... abstract concepts can be resources, such as the operators and operands of a mathematical equation, the types of a relationship (e.g., "parent" or "employee"), or numeric values (e.g., zero, one, and infinity).''
== Resources in RDF and the Semantic Web ==
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