One of the key components of an effective collaborative platform is the ability for a user to specify what is important to them. One of the ways to do this with Windows SharePoint Services v3 is with Alerts.

For example, I want to make sure that when people post comments up to the Work Together Better Blog that I respond within a reasonable period of time. To make sure that I do this, I use Alerts.

First, I log into the blog site and navigate to the Comments custom list.

I can then choose Actions | Alert Me.

I can tell SharePoint to notify me immediately when someone posts up a comment (or I could specify a weekly or monthly digest).

Once this is set up, I will receive a notification via email. I can create a rule in Outlook to let me know how to handle the alert (I could pop up a dialog or move the message to a folder).

Here is the email to notify me that the Alert is set up.

And here is an email to test out the Alert.