# Resource

Term type: Concept

A building block in the Aspire application model, such as a service, container, executable, cloud resource, or parameter.

Also known as: application resource

Resources describe the parts of your application and the values those parts need. Not every resource is a running process: parameters and logical databases are resources too.

- **Projects** describe application projects, including .NET services and APIs.
- **Containers** run packaged workloads such as databases, caches, and message brokers.
- **Executables** run programs and scripts, including JavaScript, Python, and other runtimes.
- **Cloud resources** describe services such as managed databases and storage.
- **Parameters** represent configuration values, including secrets.

Hosting integrations add specialized resource types and configuration methods to the AppHost.

## Practical example

An API, its PostgreSQL database, and the password parameter used by that database are three different resources in one AppHost.

## Learn more

- [Understand the resources in your app model](https://aspire.dev/architecture/resource-model/)

## Related terms

- [AppHost](https://aspire.dev/hub/glossary/apphost/)

- [DAG](https://aspire.dev/hub/glossary/dag/)

- [Hosting integration](https://aspire.dev/hub/glossary/hosting-integration/)