Having the ability to allow users to subscribe to a post (and therefore getting email updates when someone adds a follow-up comment) is something that I’ve been wanting to implement ever since I rolled out the first version with Ruby on Rails.

I think I first started the initial implementation of a subscription engine a few months back but it was extremely buggy and I was not satisfied with the underlying code. A couple of weeks ago, I dove in again and hacked a working version.

The implementation worked, but I was unhappy with the underlying code as it was based on code that I had written years ago. Now that my skill set has improved, I decided to rip out most of what was there and code up a cleaner version of the workable code.

After some rigorous testing, I’m finally happy with the implementation and the underlying code.

So how does it all work? Well, it’s simple really. If you want to be notified (by email) of follow-up comments to a post, click the Subscribe via email checkbox and post your comment. You’ll receive an email confirmation that let’s you know which post you’ve subscribed to. If someone posts a follow-up comment, you’ll get an email notification.

If you don’t want to be notified anymore, there is an opt-out/unsubscribe link on the emails that are sent out. Follow that link and the subscription to that specific post is terminated.