need ubuntu to work as an alarm clock for multiple alarms. Each alarm will have it's own unique mp3 and each day alarms will vary in time.

You could use cron too launch a media player like mplayer or vlc

This is the problem. I don't really know the syntax on how to do this. Do you know how to? If so could you give me an example Please...

I've never done this and don't know how. In windows It would be easy to write a batch job to do most of this, but I want something that requires less maintenance.

James

Oh guys this is really amateur stuff. ;-)

Try "vlc --help" from a shell to get an idea. U can also load complete playllists ther maybe for one day or so. Next give it a try with e.g. "vlc file://home/Music/foobar.mp3" if your desired single file you wanny play is named "foobar.mp3". To add one of these commands I mentioned ot a cron job try to install "KCron" for KDE or something more native like "Gato Command Schduler". To execute single programs on start you can also install "Kickstart."

Hope it helps you out! ;-)

Ya got the command line and pathing figured out. Still having issues getting kcron to launch VLC to actually do what I need to do. Almost there. This is exactly what I was looking for. Originally I didn't know how to launch VLC, got the pathing done and from terminal I can launch the tunes... Just can't seem to get kcron to launch.. So close, yet so far way.

James
:0)

2/3rd there.

2 lefts don't make a right.... But 3 do.......

If you do not want to learn cron then kcron is pretty straightforward as it is a GUI tool and you can select the scheduling you want from the buttons provided.

If you want to learn cron on the command line a nice tutorial is at:
http://linuxgazette.net/151/prestia.html

To automatically start a program/ script you need to include the command to start it in the "/etc/rc.local" file

I appreciate the suggestions....

I would love to do this using Kcron. It would be ideal for the customization I require but getting the jobs to fire up and actually working is testing my patients. I have loaded in Kcron and all the KDE libraries in Ubuntu. Followed the suggestions of confirming all the required things are done and made sure I saved the task, Yet Kcron failed to fire up. Maybe it would be better to run Kubuntu instead of Ubuntu. All I know is that this is getting frustrating.

I think I may have to delve back into the Dark Side of the Force. I wanted to do this in Ubuntu, but there is a time to admit defeat and time is an issue... So I may have to go back to Windows.

Has anyone successfully run Kcron on Ubuntu to play a media file? I know that I am not alone in my frustration.

If you know the syntax and could take a minute to show me the syntax I would be forever indebted. I really believe that Ubuntu is the best solution for this application and KCron and VLC both do what I want... I just need a way to figure them out for Hardy Heron.

James
"The old dog" - no new tricks.

The first 5 columns are numbers that represent these quantities:

          Minute - 0-59.
          Hour - 0-23 24-hour format.
          Day - 1-31 Day of the month.
          Month - 1-12 Month of the year.
          Weekday - 0-6 Day of the week. 0 refers to Sunday.

A complete example follows:

# min(0-59) hours(0-23) day(1-31) month(1-12) dow(0-6) command
   34 2 * * * sh /root/backup.sh

The above command will run every weekday (mon - sun), every month(1-12), every day (1-31) at 02:34

Finally found a working solution that was easy.

Found an application called Alarm Clock 0.09.10 written by Tomasz Salacinski. Application was found at

 http://linux.softpedia.com/get/Office/Scheduling/Alarm-Clock-31341.shtml
This is a fantastic application that is easy to use and is exactly what I was looking for.

Thanks for the other suggestions

:0)

James

James, the Alarm Clock is available also into universe/utils Ubuntu repositories.
Enable the Universe repository from System->Administration->Software sources
and you can install as usual.
So you can keep automatically updated the alarm-clock app.

HTH