Automatically providing notifications regarding interesting content from shared sources based on important persons and important sources for a user

Abstract

A system for automatically providing notifications to a user regarding interesting content, which automatically collects information regarding persons that are important to the user, as well as indications of important content sources. The important content sources are then monitored for actions performed by one of the important persons for the user, and notifications are generated to the user in the event that the important person performs an action on a document or other information item stored in the important content source. Important persons for a user may be determined through a communication application used by the user, such as an electronic mail program, instant messaging program, or the like, in response to indications of persons that the user has either sent messages to and/or received messages from. The notifications may be provided through the user's communication application, by electronic mail messages, instant messages, or the like. The notification may include a name, identifier, or other indication of the important person that performed the action on the important content source. Notifications may be provided to the user in response to any specific kind of action by the important persons on an important content source, such as create operations, modify operations, and/or delete operations.