Device driver is a software that works as the interface for the device controller to communicate

with the operating system or an application program.

Device drivers generally run at a high level of privilege within the operating system runtime
environment. Some device drivers, in fact, may be linked directly to the operating system kernel,
a portion of an OS such as Windows, Linux or Mac OS, that remains memory resident and handles
execution for all other code, including device drivers. Device drivers relay requests for device
access and actions from the operating system and its active applications to their respective
hardware devices. They also deliver outputs or status/messages from the hardware devices to
the operating system.
Device controller is a hardware component that works as a bridge between the hardware
device and the operating system or an application program.

Device controller is a hardware unit attached to the I/O bus of the computer and works like an
interface between a device and a device driver. It is an electronic component consisting of
chips that is responsible for handling the incoming and outgoing signals of the CPU. It acts as a
bridge between the device and the operating system which receives commands from the OS,
such as read, write or more complex commands. Each device controller has its own set of
commands, depending on the nature or the manufacturer. So, there is different software
running as part of the OS that interacts with each controller.

Thus, there is always a device controller and a device driver associated with each device
that communicates with the OS. The controller receives the data from a connected device,
stores it temporarily, and then communicates the data to its device driver. So, the device
controller interacts with the OS via the device driver.