HAL

In addition to being a primary “character” in 2001: A Space Odyssey, in computing, a HAL (Hardware Abstraction Layer), or “abstraction layer,” is a way to hide the implementation details of deep functionality, allowing the separation to facilitate interoperability and platform independence. This is how peripherals can work with computers using different operating systems. For example, an audio interface can connect to the USB port of a computer running either macOS or Windows; the interface doesn’t need to be re-coded to work with each operating system, instead the interface only needs to have a driver that can run on each operating system’s abstraction layer.