I asked:
>>> How on earth do I beep this machine from a job with no tty?

Ken Hornstein suggested:
>> Can't you send stuff to /dev/spkr?  I believe the man page has more
>> information (IIRC, it was easily done via a shell script).

I had tried the manpages, and somehow had not made any progress.

David Maxwell wrote:
> The kernel device is spkr, but the /dev entry is /dev/speaker.
> 
> Note that spkr isn't in GENERIC, so check your kernel (or your
> boot messages) to see if you have it available.

Ah!!!

I have made a new kernel, and now /dev/speaker responds.

I am now going to go off and have fun designing the tone that will
announce my little reminders. :-)

Thanks, all!


Anne.
-- 
Ms. Anne Bennett, Senior Analyst, IITS, Concordia University, Montreal H3G 1M8
anne@alcor.concordia.ca                                        +1 514 848-7606