Jamsworld the home for Jam727 Enterprises

Most people don’t really understand a lot of computer jargon, and the word ‘driver’ is no exception. Perhaps as a result you’ve done web searches for things like: “what is driver”, or something like that and hoped for simple answers.

Of course, there’s no judgement implied in that — if you didn’t understand what a driver was before this, it’s merely because it was never explained to you in an understandable way.

Don’t worry, it’ll all make sense by the end of this article.

I have a simple way to explain it that will just make sense for you. This article will help you make sense of computer terms like driver and more.

Firstly, just so we all we’re all on the same page, I’m going to take a second to clarify the difference between “hardware” and “software”.

It’s really pretty easy — “hardware” refers to all of the tangible pieces of equipment, such as your mouse, your computer’s screen, the hard drive, etc.

“Software” refers to all of the pieces of the computer that you really can’t observe or touch directly. Software would include things like a word processor, a Web browser, Windows or the Mac OS, and all of your personal files like letters, pictures, MP3s, and so on.

Here’s how you can think about it: hardware is like your brain, a physical part of your body, while software is like your mind or your thoughts — the non-physical part of yourself.

Software runs on hardware, just like your thoughts “run on” your brain.

With me so far? OK, let’s talk more specifically about drivers.

Here’s the easy way to think about what a driver is. Imagine that every piece of hardware, including your printer, your mouse, etc., talks a different language.

So one speaks Spanish, another one speaks English, a different one Swahili, etc.

So when you plug in a new printer and power it on, your computer says hello and the printer answers in a foreign language the computer can’t make sense of.

So it needs an interpreter.

And when I say interpreter, I mean just like in the real world, just like when a foreign diplomat arrives in the country but doesn’t understand the local language. The diplomat needs an interpreter to help them talk with the locals.

That, basically speaking, is what a driver is — an interpreter that helps your computer talk to a given piece of equipment. And (generally speaking) you need a different interpreter for every piece of equipment that you attach the computer.

Get it?

Now in some cases, the driver may be “preinstalled” on your computer (in other words, the computer already has the interpreter ready and waiting in case it’s needed) and other times, it needs to either be installed from a disk, or downloaded off the Internet, and then installed on the computer.

But in any case, the computer needs that driver before it can speak to the printer or whatever other thing you may have connected to the computer.

I hope you now understand what a driver is.

In this article I’m going to clarify common but frequently confused computer terminology: “operating system”, or “OS”.

Maybe you’ve found you have questions and ask yourself what OS means,, if so, you’re not alone in wondering about this.

This is actually a pretty simple idea to make sense of when you have it explained the right way, as you’ll discover as soon as you’ve finished learning from this basic computer lesson.

Let me begin by mentioning first that an OS or operating system is a kind of software.

To repeat my explanation from a previous article, here’s how you can think of software:

“Software” refers to all of the pieces of the computer that you can’t really observe or touch directly. Software would include things like Microsoft Excel, Internet Explorer, Windows or the Mac OS, as well as all of your personal files like letters, photos, MP3s, and so on.

Here’s another way to think about it: hardware is like your brain, a physical part of your body, while software is like your mind or your thoughts — the non-physical part of yourself.

Software runs on hardware, just like your thoughts “run on” your brain.

Does that make sense?So let’s look at the OS specifically.

So,let me give a couple of examples:  the two best known operating systems right now are Windows, and Mac OS X (pronounced “Oh Ess Ten” — as in the Roman numeral ten).

Windows Vista and Windows XP are two versions of Windows.  While Mac OS 10.4 ( also called”Tiger”) and the newer Mac OS 10.5 ( a.k.a”Leopard”) are a couple different versions of Mac OS X.

Alright,so what is an OS?

Here’s one way to think about it:when a baby is born, they have the instinct to eat, to breathe, and so on, and they also have the instinct to watch, listen, and absorb everything going on around them.

In time, a young child learns to talk and walk by observing the people around them, and as they get older, they also learn more basic skills like reading and writing, hand-eye coordination, and so on.

So in other words, they go from barely being able to anything but eat, sleep, and fill diapers, to physical and mental maturity where they have all the basic skills they need to learn more specific skills such as learning to drive, playing a sport like soccer, writing a paper for a class, getting a job ,etc.

In some ways, when you start up a computer, it’s sort of like a newborn baby, only having one or two fundamental”instincts.”

The computer can power on, and display an image on the monitor, but that’s about it.

The only other thing the computer can do is look at the hard drive, and if it finds the information it needs there, it can start running the OS.

This is called “booting”, which is what happens between when you turn the computer on, and when you can actually start using it.

And the best way to think about it is that it’s just like a child being born and growing up: the OS has the “life experiences” and lessons that give a “child” all the basic skills equivalent to walking, talking, reading, writing, etc., that allow everything else to hapen.

So in a sense, it’s as if your computer is “born” and “grows up” in the space of 30 to 60 seconds or so( sometimes longer for some computers) that it takes to “boot” the OS.

So, the OS is much like those fundamental skills we all have and learned as we grew up. More precisely, it’s the software on your computer that draws its desktop, the icons on it, moves the little mouse pointer around on the screen when you move your mouse around, lets you view and open files, lets you type, — you get the idea.

Without the OS, you couldn’t do anything with a PC but turn it on and see an error message such as”non system disk or disk error” on a Windows-type computer, or a flashing question mark on one of Apple’s Macs.

So even though a lot of people don’t really understand what an OS is, or what it does, none of us could use a PC without it.

Now you know the answer to what’s an OS and what’s it for.