Driver software is software that works as a translator among another program and some piece of hardware. In the software industry, there are commonly standard ways to do things. There are many dissimilar types of hardware, though, and each piece of hardware may have its own protocol (or "language"). The driver software receives standard signals from another program, and then translates these into commands for a particular piece of hardware. This way a program can be written in a standard way, and it will work with many dissimilar devices.