Glossary · Automation software engineering and architecture
Communication driver
Also known as: Protocol driver, I/O driver
German: Kommunikationstreiber
In industrial automation, a communication driver is a software component that implements a communication protocol or interface, such as a fieldbus, industrial Ethernet or serial protocol, so that an application like a SCADA system, HMI or gateway can exchange data with devices without handling protocol details itself.
- Software engineering
In one sentence
A communication driver implements a protocol or interface so an application such as SCADA or an HMI can exchange data with devices.
Example
The SCADA server uses a Modbus TCP communication driver to poll energy meters and an S7 driver to read data blocks from the line PLCs.
How it applies
- Engineering: Drivers map device addresses, registers or objects to application tags, handle connection setup, polling or subscriptions, data conversion and error recovery. Their configuration, such as poll rates and timeouts, strongly affects network load and data freshness.
- Commissioning and maintenance: Many communication problems show up as driver errors: timeouts, wrong byte order or wrong addressing. Driver diagnostics and logs are the first place to look.
- Documentation: Document the driver and protocol version, supported functions, address mapping, data types, byte order, scaling and error behavior. Integration guides for customers should state which drivers and firmware versions have been tested together.
Communication driver vs. device driver
A Device driver typically runs in the operating system and gives software access to a piece of hardware, such as a network card. A communication driver works at the protocol level and often runs in user space inside an application. Both are frequently called 'drivers', so specify which is meant.