SPI is a low-level 3 or 4 wire serial bus interface with clock (SCLK), data in (MISO) and data out (MOSI). The fourth wire is a Slave Select to uniquely select a device on the bus. This signal is usually active-low. Slave Select, Chip Select, CS#, SS# stand for the same function, typically. Be sure to check the datasheet, though. The SPI bus is a *de facto* standard lacking the formal specification.
Further reading:
- Microchip SPI tutorial (pdf)
- Overview wiki on SPI bus. Of interest is the chapter about lack of formal standard and the variety of protocol variations.
