A central notifications manager user interface is employed for presenting and managing notifications and alerts received from a plurality of different sources in a consistent and uniform format. The different sources can include one or more business productivity programs, such as a word processor, spreadsheet, presentation manager, or email/personal information manager software application, as well a messaging service that produces alerts transmitted over the Internet. The user can selectively enable the display of pop-up reminders to notify the user when a task becomes due, and can selectively display an entire list of notifications and alerts that are active, enabling the user to manage (i.e., edit) the notifications and alerts within the source application. Pop-up display of notifications is automatically disabled during a presentation to avoid undesired display interruptions.