Puppet users - Jan 2014 - Detect when files are put in a directory? And alternatives?

I'm a puppet newbie but have gone through the tutorial and now read most of 
a book on the subject.    (So please tell me if I am approaching the 
problem wrong conceptually).

Problem:   We want a directory where any user can put a file which will 
signify a program that is to be installed by Puppet.   i.e.  If one were to 
go to this special location and do 'touch someSpecialCompileOfApache'
then
Puppet would see the new file in the directory and we would have additional 
logic to then install a special compile of apache.  (just a simple 
contrived example)

The first hurdle seems to be that 'notify' s don't get triggered on
a
directory if files are merely put in the directory.    Are my findings here 
correct?   It seems the directory itself would have to change to trigger 
the notify?  ie the name of the directory or a permission?  That seems to 
nix the first attempt.

Assuming I am right so far,   I thought of a second possibly simpler 
approach.   I wanted to have one text file.    Each line in the text file 
would contain an entry for a program that was to be installed.   I'm sure I 
can get notify's when the single file is changed.   Is puppet sophisticated 
enough that I could see what the change was in the text file and then 
determine an action based on that?  

Thanks in advance.

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