Frequent commenters on Sidepodcast will likely be aware of the pop-up alert functionality we added over two years ago. The simple visual notification system enables users to follow conversations across the site while browsing other tabs or using another application entirely. Disappointingly, since the introduction of the feature back in 2010, Google Chrome had thus far been the only browser to support the handy functionality.

Thankfully, with the release of Apple's Mountain Lion operating system on Wednesday, the Safari browser has also joined this exclusive internet party. Of course, that alone isn't particularly exciting news, but along with the additional browser support, Mountain Lion added a whole new level of pop-up alert customisation - now you can have new Sidepodcast comments appear in your desktop sidebar and more.

A little fine tuning

There are a raft of tweaks available to tune notifications to your liking and because incoming comments act like any other notification, they'll sit comfortably between your daily calendar schedule, recent tweets and important email.

Enabling notifications in Chrome or Safari on Mountain Lion (or any operating system supported by Chrome) requires simply selecting the option at the top of any comment thread. You can uncheck the option at any time to switch notifications off again.

If you visit our recent comments page, you'll receive alerts for every comment posted across the whole site, or browsing to a specific topic will ensure you only receive the alerts you are particularly interested in. You can of course open multiple threads in separate tabs to follow many individual conversations.

You can try out the system yourself using the comments below or this conveniently prepared test thread. Feel free to play to your heart's content.

Finally, fear not fans of alternate operating systems and browsers, you need not feel left out either. Rumour has it the next version of Windows will sport similar functionality, and there's little reason for other browser developers to hold out on this super useful technology for much longer.