Notification at the end of builds

2009-11-05 · Embedded Linux, OpenEmbedded, build

I do quite a few OpenEmbedded project builds during the course of a week. This process usually takes 3-5 minutes. That is just enough time to get distracted doing something else and forget about the build until an hour later when you realize – oops, I was supposed to send out a release email once the build was finished and uploaded. It occured to me that it would be nice if my computer played a distinct sound at the end of the build. With Linux this is incredibly easy:

wget http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/76/Ding_Dong_Bell.ogg
sudo mv Ding_Dong_Bell.ogg /usr/local/
sudo aptitude install cplay
sudo echo “cplay /usr/local/Ding_Dong_Bell.ogg” > /usr/local/bin/bell
sudo chmod 775 /usr/local/bin/bell

Now, when I have a long build, I simply do something like:

bitbake my-image; bell

There is probably something better than cplay that does not start a UI – any suggestions?