The SourceHandler interface provides a method for conveniently accessing the attributes of a message:

String getAlertSetting(String pSouceId, String pSourceType,
String pMessageType)

ATG Portal includes three classes that implement the SourceHandler interface, one for each of the three types of Portal alerts: GearSourceHandler, AdministrativeSourceHandler, and FrameworkSourceHandler. If you need to extend the Portal alert system to include other types of alerts, you can create a new class that implements SourceHandler for that alert type.