Command line beep using Bash

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I wanted to make a little script that could make a beep or some fun sound when a long-running terminal process was complete… Because who sits there and watches the terminal all day when we have websites to browse and applications to write?

I found a little script on StackExchange which would produce a simple beep by running a command like “_alarm 400 200”. The command uses an underscore to denote that it’s a custom function, in case there’s another application called “alarm”.

I then created a command called “jobdone” which runs several synchronous instances of the _alarm command to create a short song. To me it sounds like “♫ the job is done ♫”. You can modify the numbers or create your own methods with their own alarm commands to create custom tones.

1. Open your .bashrc file under ~/.bashrc

   $ gedit ~/.bashrc

2. Add the following code to the end of the file:

   # code from http://unix.stackexchange.com/a/163716 
   # modified by Allan Bogh
   _alarm() {
     ( \speaker-test --frequency $1 --test sine )&
     pid=$!
     \sleep $(bc -l <<< ${2}/1000)s
     \kill -9 $pid
   }
   
   # code from https://allanbogh.com/2016/01/04/command-line-beep-using-bash/ ‎
   jobdone() {
     _alarm 800 150 && _alarm 900 150 && _alarm 1000 150 && _alarm 1200 300
   }
   

3. Open a new terminal window and type the function name:

   $ jobdone
   
   # or use it with another long-running command
   $ someCommand && jobdone
   
   # for example
   sleep 10s && jobdone
   

Try using the command “jobdone” in the terminal by itself, then play around with “_alarm 800 200” by changing the 2 numbers.

Fun test!

Here’s a script I wrote which plays a fun song. Can you guess which song I created? To execute this, copy the functions into your .bashrc file using the instructions above, then use the “funsong” command in a new terminal window!

_mySong() {
  #staff 1
  _alarm 196.00 150 && _alarm 261.63 150 && _alarm 329.63 150 && _alarm 392 150 && _alarm 523.25 150 && _alarm 659.25 150 && _alarm 783.99 500 && _alarm 659.25 500
  
  #staff 2
  _alarm 207.65 150 && _alarm 261.63 150 && _alarm 311.13 150 && _alarm 415.30 150 && _alarm 523.25 150 && _alarm 622.25 150 && _alarm 830.61 500 && _alarm 622.25 500
  
  #staff 3
  _alarm 233.08 150 && _alarm 293.66 150 && _alarm 349.23 150 && _alarm 466.16 150 && _alarm 587.33 150 && _alarm 698.46 150 && _alarm 932.33 500 && _alarm 987.77 150 && _alarm 987.77 150 && _alarm 987.77 150 && _alarm 1046.50 1000
}
funsong() {
  _mySong &
  sleep 0.015s
  _mySong &
  sleep 0.03s
  _mySong &
  wait
  echo "Can you guess which song this was?"
  echo "Visit https://allanbogh.com/2016/01/04/command-line-beep-in-ubuntu/ and leave a comment."
}