I think this is a great idea. Here are some use cases to help with design.
Survey
-When a new response is made some admin want to be notified.
-There is a demand for a "feedback form" where the results will be emailed to the person being evaluated.
File Storage-
I know students would like to be able to choose to be notified when "comments" are uploaded on their homework.
Yahoo provides notification when a new file is upload, people may want that but they would need to control it.
News-
Not sure if Sloan wants it yet but numerous other clients have asked to have news emailed.
Calendar-
Again email reminders are a fairly standard feature people expect.
Group Management -
Sloan needs emails when people request membership to a group and then a confirmation email when they are approved/denied.
LMS-
As we move towards a full LMS we will probably want something like workflow, where students are assigned tasks and various TA/Profs are notified and perhaps assigned tasks. Here is a random example to illustrate the potential complexity. example..student reads a section and then is assigned as problem set. When the problem set is uploaded the TA is notified and assigned a task to grade it. When the student completes an entire section he is given an Exam and the completed exam is assigned to the professor for grading. Based on the score the student is assigned a remedial section.
This is not an issue for now, but it brings up the question of how a new notifications package would interact with workflow package. Will workflow use general notifications?
