diff --git a/.gitignore b/.gitignore
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..8675c2d
--- /dev/null
+++ b/.gitignore
@@ -0,0 +1,3 @@
+config.php
+queries.txt
+cookies.txt
\ No newline at end of file
diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
index 9c53303..6e5c5ac 100644
--- a/README.md
+++ b/README.md
@@ -1,4 +1,19 @@
 google_alerts_creator
 =====================
 
-A class for creating Google Alerts in bulk ( even though there is not an official API ).
+
+Notes
+-----
+- A class for creating Google Alerts in bulk ( even though there is not an official API ).
+- Based on this Stack Overflow question and answer
+	- http://stackoverflow.com/questions/13528747/how-to-create-new-google-alert-delivering-it-to-feed-using-php-curl
+
+
+Usage
+-----
+1. copy `config.php.example` to `config.php`
+	- add your google account credentials
+	- set your desired alert settings
+2. copy `queries.txt.example` to `queries.txt`
+	- add your alert queries to this file, one per line
+3. execute `create_google_alerts.php`
\ No newline at end of file
diff --git a/config.php.example b/config.php.example
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..1de3e97
--- /dev/null
+++ b/config.php.example
@@ -0,0 +1,41 @@
+<?php
+
+
+	// --- GOOGLE ACCOUNT SETTINGS -------------------------
+
+
+	define( 'GOOGLE_USERNAME', YOUR-GOOGLE-EMAIL-ADDRESS );
+	define( 'GOOGLE_PASSWORD', YOUR-GOOGLE-EMAIL-PASSWORD );
+
+
+	// --- ALERT SETTINGS ----------------------------------
+
+	
+	// alert frequency ( how often you recieve emails )
+	//	- as it happens: 0
+	//	- daily: 1
+	//	- weekly: 6
+	define( 'ALERT_FREQUENCY', 1 );
+	
+	// result type ( what to seaerch )
+	//	- everything: 7
+	//	- discussions: 8
+	//	- news: 1
+	//	- blogs: 4
+	//	- video: 9
+	//	- books: 22
+	define( 'ALERT_RESULT_TYPE', 7 );
+
+	// result quality filter
+	//	- best results: 0
+	//	- all results: 1
+	define( 'ALERT_QUALITY', 0 );
+	
+
+	// --- CURL SETTINGS ----------------------------------
+
+
+	define( 'GOOGLE_COOKIEFILE', 'cookies.txt' );
+	
+	
+?>
\ No newline at end of file
diff --git a/create_google_alerts.php b/create_google_alerts.php
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..76d2064
--- /dev/null
+++ b/create_google_alerts.php
@@ -0,0 +1,17 @@
+<?php
+
+	require( dirname( __FILE__ ) . '/google_alerts_class.php' );
+	
+	$Ga = new Google_alerts_class();
+	
+	$query_file_contents = file_get_contents( dirname( __FILE__ ) . '/queries.txt' );
+	$queries = explode( "\n", $query_file_contents );
+	
+	foreach( $queries as $query ) {
+		echo "\n  - '$query' Alert Created";
+		$Ga->createAlert( $query );
+	}
+	
+	echo "\n\n";
+
+?>
\ No newline at end of file
diff --git a/google_alerts_class.php b/google_alerts_class.php
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..5080794
--- /dev/null
+++ b/google_alerts_class.php
@@ -0,0 +1,132 @@
+<?php
+
+	require( dirname( __FILE__ ) . '/config.php' );
+
+	class Google_alerts_class
+	{
+		
+		public function createAlert( $search ) {
+	
+	        $ch = curl_init();
+	        curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_CONNECTTIMEOUT, 30);
+	        curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_USERAGENT, "Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.1)");
+	        curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER, true);
+	        curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_SSL_VERIFYPEER, false);
+	        curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_FOLLOWLOCATION, 1);
+	        curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_COOKIEJAR, GOOGLE_COOKIEFILE);
+	        curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_COOKIEFILE, GOOGLE_COOKIEFILE);
+	        curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_HEADER, 0);
+	        curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER,1);
+	        curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_CONNECTTIMEOUT, 120);
+	        curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_TIMEOUT, 120);
+	
+	        curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_URL,
+	        'https://accounts.google.com/ServiceLogin?hl=en&service=alerts&continue=http://www.google.com/alerts/manage');
+	        $data = curl_exec($ch);
+	
+	        $formFields = $this->getFormFields( $data );
+	
+	        $formFields['Email']  = GOOGLE_USERNAME;
+	        $formFields['Passwd'] = GOOGLE_PASSWORD;
+	        unset($formFields['PersistentCookie']);
+	
+	        $post_string = '';
+	        foreach($formFields as $key => $value) {
+	        	$post_string .= $key . '=' . urlencode($value) . '&';
+	        }
+	
+	        $post_string = substr($post_string, 0, -1);
+	
+	        curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_URL, 'https://accounts.google.com/ServiceLoginAuth');
+	        curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_POST, 1);
+	        curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_POSTFIELDS, $post_string);
+	
+	        $result = curl_exec($ch);
+	
+	        if (strpos($result, '<title>Redirecting') === false) {
+	            var_dump($result);
+	            die("Login failed");
+	        } else {
+
+	            curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_URL, 'http://www.google.com/alerts');
+	            curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_POST, 0);
+	            curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_POSTFIELDS, null);
+	
+	            $result = curl_exec($ch);
+	
+	            // Create alert
+	
+	            preg_match('/<input type="hidden" name="x" value="([^"]+)"/', $result, $matches);
+	
+	            $post = array(
+	                "x" => $matches[1],			// anti-XSRF key
+	                "q" => $search,				// Search term  
+	                "t" => ALERT_RESULT_TYPE,	// Result type: 7-everything, 8-discussions
+	                "f" => ALERT_FREQUENCY,		// Frequency: 0: as it happens, 1: daily, 6: weekly
+	                "l" => ALERT_QUALITY,		// All results: 1, best results: 0
+	                "e" => GOOGLE_USERNAME		// Type of delivery: rss: "feed"
+	            );
+	
+	            $post_string = '';
+	
+	            foreach($post as $key => $value) {
+	                $post_string .= $key . '=' . urlencode($value) . '&';
+	            }
+	
+	            $post_string = substr($post_string, 0, -1);
+				
+	            curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_URL, 'http://www.google.com/alerts/create');
+	            curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_POST, 1);
+	            curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_POSTFIELDS, $post_string);
+	
+	            $result = curl_exec($ch);
+	            $matches = array();
+	            preg_match('#<a href="(http://www.google.com/alerts/feeds/[\d/]+)"#', $result, $matches);
+	
+	            $top_alert = $matches[1];
+	
+	            return $top_alert;
+	        }
+	    }
+	
+	
+	    private function getFormFields($data)
+	    {
+	        if (preg_match('/(<form.*?id=.?gaia_loginform.*?<\/form>)/is', $data, $matches)) {
+	            $inputs = $this->getInputs($matches[1]);
+	
+	            return $inputs;
+	        } else {
+	            die("didn't find login form");
+	        }
+	    }
+	
+	    private function getInputs($form)
+	    {
+	        $inputs = array();
+	
+	        $elements = preg_match_all('/(<input[^>]+>)/is', $form, $matches);
+	
+	        if ($elements > 0) {
+	            for($i = 0; $i < $elements; $i++) {
+	                $el = preg_replace('/\s{2,}/', ' ', $matches[1][$i]);
+	
+	                if (preg_match('/name=(?:["\'])?([^"\'\s]*)/i', $el, $name)) {
+	                    $name  = $name[1];
+	                    $value = '';
+	
+	                    if (preg_match('/value=(?:["\'])?([^"\'\s]*)/i', $el, $value)) {
+	                        $value = $value[1];
+	                    }
+	
+	                    $inputs[$name] = $value;
+	                }
+	            }
+	        }
+	
+	        return $inputs;
+	    }
+
+	} // end class	    
+
+?>
\ No newline at end of file
diff --git a/queries.txt.example b/queries.txt.example
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..c8b52d9
--- /dev/null
+++ b/queries.txt.example
@@ -0,0 +1,2 @@
+some sample queries
+a query with some ( boolean OR advanced ) terms
\ No newline at end of file