Patent ID: 7895529

Claim:
A computer-implemented method for processing featured content on a client computer, the client computer having an operating system, the operating system including a system registry, the system registry containing information about computer configuration that the operating system continuously references during operation, the information including the applications installed on the computer, the types of documents creatable by the applications, the properties of folders and program icons, and the hardware configuration, the method comprising: generating a signal indicating a successful boot of a software application; generating, upon receipt of the signal indicating a successful boot of a software application without user input, a database query for featured content items, the featured content items having information focused on a specific topic, wherein the query comprises an identifier related to a particular topic, and wherein the featured content items forming the data set have at least one database attribute that is associated with the identifier, wherein each featured content item is associated with a plurality of database attributes including a priority status field; receiving featured content items in response to the database query; storing the featured content items in a local memory; selecting a predetermined number of featured content items from the featured content items stored in the local memory; storing the selected featured content items in the system registry; in response to receiving a command from the software application to display at least one featured content item, wherein the command to display at least one featured content item is invoked during the boot process of a calling software application without user input, wherein user input includes pointer device movement, retrieving featured content items stored in the system registry and displaying the featured content items on a graphical user interface.