Activation process for subscriptions

To determine the number of allowed activations for your compiled workbook EXE, the web application stores custom data into WooCommerce orders thanks to the Custom Fields feature.

When a customer purchases a subscription for your compiled workbook EXE through WooCommerce, an initial order is generated and appears in the Orders list. This initial order which created the subscription is named the parent order.

For a given subscription, you can find the parent order by editing the subscription and in the Related Orders section, the Parent Order is indicated:

Activation and validation processes for a subscription managed by the web application use the activation token that identifies the subscription in the WooCommerce database (see Configuring the Excel workbook for subscriptions).

For instance, [email protected] is a valid activation token. The web application will use the number after the - character to identify the subscription’s parent order ID in the WooCommerce database. Then, it will check whether the email address stored in the order suits the email provided in the activation token before the - character. Finally, the web application retrieves subscription details.

This activation token must be sent to the customer who purchased your workbook. This token lets them activate the workbook. Some WooCommerce plug-ins allow sending emails to customers after purchase (see Sending activation token to customers in case of subscriptions): be sure to include the activation token in the email.

When customers run the compiled workbook EXE file, a dialog box appears telling them that an activation is required. As said before, the dialog box must at least ask for the activation token (you can name it what you want but the associated HTML field ID must be “token”, see onfiguring the Excel workbook for subscriptions).

When the customer clicks Activate, data is sent to the activation server:

The WooCommerce kit on the activation server will check the subscription’s status and different settings.

This ensures that only paid customers with an active subscription can activate your workbook.

After a successful activation, a confirmation message is shown, and the compiled workbook EXE is restarted. If an error occurs, the corresponding message box is shown, and customer can try to activate again.