OpenGL Texture is not (just) Picture

I'm a beginner in OpenGL for sure and one of the most confusing thing (read: naming convention) that has plagued me in these last two days is OpenGL texture. Contrary to the naming for functions, constants and objects used for OpenGL texture, everything related to texture on those "interfaces" don't really apply to image/picture only. It's much more general than that. OpenGL texture is basically a "lookup-table" (array) and it can store anything as long as the data type matches with the texture that you use in your code. The naming for OpenGL texture "interface" that usually implies the use of image/picture is a legacy of the past. It was used since the day of fixed-function video card and used until now to preserve API backward-compatibility--at least that's one of the reason that I'm aware of.

Anyway, these are some useful links regarding OpenGL texture:
http://www.mathematik.uni-dortmund.de/~goeddeke/gpgpu/tutorial.html#arrays1
http://www.arcsynthesis.org/gltut/Texturing/Tutorial%2014.html

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