US 8,914,790 B2 · Contextual solicitation in a starter application

Abstract

A reduced capability subset of an application referred to as a “starter application” is provided on a computer device prior to purchase and intended for use by a user purchasing the computer device. The starter application may monitor input from the user when the starter application is executing to ascertain opportunities to inform the user of an upgrade and then solicit the user for purchasing the upgrade. The starter application may use a limited access browser to contact a server to assist in the solicitation and complete the transaction. Upon completing the transaction, the upgrade is provided to the computing device. The upgrade may comprise the full capability version of the application, templates, clip art, or other software. The upgrade may entail transmitting the upgrade to the computer device or providing an authorization key to unlock the upgrade that is already stored on the computer device.

Claims11

Dependent claims

A computer readable storage medium storing instructions that when executed by a processor of a computing device cause the processor to:

monitor input from a user for editing a document received by a starter application executing on the processor, the input provided by a user of the starter application, the starter application comprising a subset of functions of a full application;
ascertain based on the input from the user an opportunity to solicit the user to receive an upgrade;
in response to the input performed on the document by the user, solicit the user by the starter application to purchase the upgrade by prompting the user to purchase the upgrade;
complete a transaction to purchase the upgrade;
and
enable access to the upgrade by the computing device.

3 more elements

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.

Contextual solicitation in a starter application

Life of this patent

Contextual solicitation in a starter application

Life of this patent

Abstract

Claims11