Marketplace App Activation Proposal

Hi Guys!

I have been thinking about this for quite a long time now, as some of you know, and i have been refining my ideas for quite some time now, taking into account all the issues that may be involved (buyer privacy, ease of use etc.) And i think i have come up with a refined idea that will work and will enable us developers to protect our files from copyright theft that slight bit better.

It is the use of serial codes, by this point i would be expecting all of the envato administation to be staring in horror at that word. But i’m not asking for a complete serialisation of a load of files. It will be up to each individual author to apply serial activation to his / her files. And it therefore depends if each individual author thinks it is worth the “hassle” of creating serial activation on his / her files.

This is how I imagine the work flow will look like:

When a buyer is asked by the application to get the serial code, it will also provide a link to a set of instructions on either the author’s site or the marketplace sites which will instruct the buyer how to get the serial code.

The buyer will get the serial code by going to the downloads page, and clicking on an icon or a button to generate and get the serial code:

Only then would a serial code be generated for that purchase, and then shown to the buyer.

The serial codes, i imagine, will be stored in a seperate table, which will have the serial code itself (which will also serve as an entry identifier), the item ID to which the serial code belongs, and the license type.

Creating the serial code only when the buyer requests it means there will be no extra load on the marketplace server and that it makes it much easier for this system to be implemented.

An API would then need to be created to allow a seperate web server to communicate with the envato server by requesting a simple check:

The Authors server sends a request to the envato server with two parameters (the serial code, and the product ID). The envato server would then simply respond true or false.

The implementation of this system on envatos side would mean that authors could easily create product activation for their files and reduce the illegal distribution of our files by requiring serial codes, which for the buyer is effortless and only has to be done once. Of course there will be people who try to remove the activation from the php, flash or javascript files. But anny effort to try and prevent copyright violation is good.

Let’s hear what you guys think, any suggestions or critisisms are welcomed.

Forgot to mention that the use of a serial code would mean that we never find out the buyer’s username

Also, the serial code daabase table would need to store the username (or just a purchase ID, if there is one) to ensure only one serial code is created per purchase.

It’s passable

But I think it requests that file based in using PHP or any other server script (write something or change something when install app) ?

some templates are applicable

Ordinary files are not applicable

Otherwise ,if that installed file can be copied and can be used repeatedly ?

P.S. Maybe i didn’t understand what you mean

It depends on how the author applies this api to their app. If they have it so that, for example, it sends the domain aswell as the serial code along with the check, and it checks with the authors server every time the admin panel is accessed, that this app is installed on the domain that the serial code was activated with. And if it has been copied from a different domain and installed on another server, it deactivated the app

So yeah, the author’s server will assign a domain to each serial key. And if a buyer requests, a set domain can be deactivated so that It can be used on a different server.

And yeah, flash apps will probably need php files to acompany them.

but i did not understand who will ask the buyer for the password? is it the project itself ? so if I make a flash or PHP application i may want to check if the user has the right password or not when the user install me application for the first time on his website?

The application asks for it