InstallShield offers different types of trialware to help protect your product from piracy:

- Try and Buy/Product Activation—This type of trialware enables your prospective customers to evaluate your product before deciding whether to buy it. It also is suitable for customers who have already purchased your product. After the predetermined trial limit has been reached on an end user's machine, the trialware no longer runs on that machine unless the end user activates it by using a serial number that you provide to them when they pay for the product.
- Try and Die—This type of trialware also enables your prospective customers to evaluate your product before buying it. After the predetermined trial limit has been reached on an end user's machine, the trial version no longer runs on that machine. If prospective customers decides to purchase the product, they need to obtain the unprotected version from you and install it. This type of trialware is available in the Premier edition of InstallShield only.

With the InstallShield Activation Service Publisher Web Site, you can manage your licenses and other Try and Buy/Product Activation trialware data online. Visit the InstallShield Activation Service Publisher Web Site to do the following:

- Add to your licenses the serial numbers that end users will use to activate your product.
- Modify license and serial number properties such as number of activations allowed and enabled vs. disabled status.
- Perform offline activations for your end users.
- Run reports to track the number of activations, gather metrics on the success of a new product introduction, identify serial numbers that end users might be abusing, and much more.

## 共享测试技术

With the Trialware view, you can configure a license for trialware. InstallShield uses the license to wrap a trialware shell around your product's executable file (.exe file, .dll file, .ocx, or .scr file). The file can be unwrapped and used only according to the license settings that you configure, such as the trial limit (a specified number of days or a specified number of uses). Using InstallShield to protect your product lets you:

- Invest minimal time and expense to turn your product into trialware.
- Set firm expiration dates using sophisticated, flexible technology that blocks unauthorized extensions of trials.
- Specify hyperlinks that should be displayed in the trialware run-time dialogs, which are launched whenever end users launch a protected application. The hyperlinks direct users to Web pages that inform them, for example, how to purchase your product.
- Ensure that paid-for copies of your product automatically revert to trial mode when they are shared with other end users.

The trialware technology available in InstallShield should not be confused with freeware or shareware. Often freeware and shareware have limited functionality. For example, end users sometimes cannot print anything from shareware or freeware, or a watermark might be added to every page. Such limitations are established to encourage prospective customers to purchase a fully functional version of a product; however, building such limitations into your product can be costly and waste valuable development time.

With trialware, the only limitation is the time limit or the limited number of uses. You enable a prospective customer to use the latest version of your product—with all of its features fully available—on a trial basis. No dongle is used to limit or lock software access. After a predetermined trial limit has been reached, the trialware expires.

For more details about trialware technology, see Trialware Technology in the InstallShield Help Library.

To learn how to remove a license from a test machine, see Testing a Trialware Release of Your Product in the InstallShield Help Library.

## Trialware Run-Time Dialogs

Whenever an end user launches a protected trial product, a trialware run-time dialog or message box opens before the application starts. For more information, including samples of dialogs, see Trialware Run-Time Dialogs in the InstallShield Help Library.