Feature Request: Play sound when timer is up

[johnnyitd]

Hello.
Just found out about Ontime and it's great. Even better than a paid software of this kind.

I run a 1 man show, so there is no sound engineers and lightning guys running around. Is it possible to play sounds when the timer reaches zero? A notification of some sort. I just can't keep my eyes on the clock all the time. Would be extremely helpful.

[cpvalente]

Hi @johnnyitd,

First of all, thank you for your kind words, it is encouraging to receive positive feedback from users.
I also appreciate that users take to get involved with Ontime, good stuff!

As for your request, I have generally been against including sounds in Ontime.
Mostly in principle:

• Ontime provides integrations which make it easy to get another software to do this
• Once we add this to Ontime, there will be a (reasonable) expectations on features around this (upload sound files, different sounds for different alerts / events, configure which views use the feature...)

However, I have received this request often enough that I will reconsider.

Could you provide some feedback as to how a minimum viable product would look like?
How long does the sound play for? A single "pling" once the timer reaches 0?
In which views does it play?

[johnnyitd]

Well yeah, in theory I could start up vMix or qLab to get HTTP request and play the sounds.
But it would take around 2 hours to set it up and will always require to run them side by side. Not very convenient and a hassle to use every time. If you know any easier way, please let me know :).

I imagined that there will be an option in the settings to play a notification sound when the timer ends. Cue countdown ends and the sound goes.

A more complicated approach would have an option to upload your .wav or .mp3 file. And maybe an option to repeat the notification if timer is still going down.

[alex-Arc]

Are you expecting the sound to play in the client views or from the server?

[johnnyitd]

If it would play in browser window where you open production clocks it would be great.

[kev-ac]

If it would play in browser window (...) it would be great.

This could be a problem because of autoplay policies of major browsers. You might not be able to definitely make sure that the sound will play. Browsers could deny the request if it did not proceed any user interaction.

[cpvalente]

Hi @johnnyitd

I had a change of mind relating to this feature and I believe we should prioritise the implementation of a minimal feature.

We are currently reviewing the specifications of the views and will try to include this

Feature specification

• in the view settings, user should be able to enable a "play sound on end" toggle
• this sound is loaded in the app and not configured by the user
• if the above is enabled the /timer view will play a sound as described. We would need to generate an event in the client when the timer phase goes from danger to overtime
• there should be a parameter (mute: Boolean) override in ParamEditor to disable this for a single client.