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Device Driver Development (Compact 2013)

3/26/2014

Device drivers are software components that communicate with physical or virtual devices. Device drivers control hardware peripherals such as network adapters, display adapters, mouse devices, keyboards, serial ports, and storage devices. Some device drivers control hardware buses that connect peripheral devices to your target platform, while others control virtual devices (such as a file system) instead of hardware peripherals.

Each device driver encapsulates and abstracts the functionality of its underlying hardware, and makes this functionality available to the OS and applications through an application programming interface (API). This makes it possible for the OS and applications to use the hardware without consideration for the hardware implementation. Windows Embedded Compact 2013 offers many options to address the needs of different platforms, diverse hardware devices, and varying product requirements.

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