Product activation

Product activation is a license validation procedure required by some proprietary software programs. Product activation prevents unlimited free use of copied or replicated software. Unactivated software refuses to fully function until it determines whether it is authorized to fully function. Activation allows the software to stop blocking its use. An activation can last "forever", or it can have a time limit, requiring a renewal or re-activation for continued use. Product activation is often based on verification of a product key, which is a sequence of letters and/or numbers that is verified via an algorithm or mathematical formula, for a particular solution or set of solutions, possibly combined with verification in a database or some other method for verification which can be done via the internet. If the solution matches expectations, and verification confirms that the product key is genuine, the product is activated. Using hashing, it is possible to represent letters as numbers before verification.

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