Patent ID: 8707328

Claim:
An application program switching method, for an electronic device comprising a first body and a second body, wherein the second body has a keyboard, the method comprising: receiving an external message during a first application program being executed on the electronic device; changing a relative position of the first body and the second body from a first state to a second state to activate a second application program, and a displayed image of the electronic device being switched from an executing frame of the first application program to an executing frame of the second application program to reply to the external message, wherein the keyboard functions as an input interface of the second application program, the first application program is continually executed in the background, the executing frame of the second application program is transitorily displayed on the first display screen, and the executing frame of the first application is immediately switched back to being actively displayed; and changing the relative position of the first body and the second body from the second state to the first state to switch the displayed image of the electronic device from the executing frame of the second application program to the executing frame of the first application program, so as to continually execute the first application program, wherein the first application program and the second application program are switched by manually changing the relative position of the first body and the second body of the electronic device between the first state and the second state and the first application program is active when the electronic device is in the first state, and the second application program is active when the electronic device is in the second state.