Notice I am not a patent attorney, and you should ultimately seek legal guidance. Additional information is based on information in the united states.

General information.

Most likely you will submit a utility patent. This must be novel, nonobvious, and useful.

The US is now first to file, no longer first to invent.

Software patents are difficult to obtain.

A prior art search is done before you submit for a patent.

You have one year to file if you have made your invention for sale, or publicly disclosed it without an NDA.

You can file for a nonprovisional which gives you one more year to file your provisional filing.

I am not aware of your situation, so I would suggest watching the IP video provided by the US patent office, look at the following link, and contact a patent attorney for a 1 hour consultation.

http://www.uspto.gov/patents-getting-started/general-informa...