I Just Wanna Beep

[Richard Crist]

Senior Developer / .NET & C# newbie here. I just wanna beep when my "Times Up" messagebox pops up. Ive searched here and there and discovered the Metafile class PlaySound method. It wont let me use it because of protections and so forth. How can I beep? I reckon there are DirectX SDKs and so forth, but for the record is there a simple way to beep in .NET?

 

[Diesel]

[DllImport("kernel32.dll")]
private extern static bool Beep ( int dwFreq , int dwDuration ) ;

public static void BeepPcInternal(int freq , int duration)
{
Beep(freq,duration);


}

 

[Richard Crist]

Thank you, Diesel! I will check this out and let you know how it goes.

 

[Richard Crist]

It Worked!

[DllImport("kernel32.dll")]
private extern static bool Beep ( int dwFreq , int dwDuration ) ;

public static void BeepPcInternal(int freq , int duration)
{
Beep(freq,duration);


}

I was able to get it to work! At the top of my C# source I had to include a

using System.Runtime.InteropServices;

but after I did that it worked! It only beeps the pc speaker. I reckon you have to do fancy SDK stuff to use the sound card, but I am happy to have my beep. Thank you very much!

 

[Mike_R]

Actually, you could just use the PlaySound API. There may be built-in .Net methods as well (I dont know) but PlaySound works fine:

    Private Declare Function PlaySound Lib "winmm.dll" Alias "PlaySoundA" _
        (ByVal lpszName As String, ByVal hModule As Long, ByVal dwFlags As Long) As Long
    Private Const SND_ASYNC As Integer = &H1
    Private Const SND_ALIAS As Integer = &H10000

Then call:

Call PlaySound("C:\\Windows\\Media\\Tada.wav", 0, SND_ASYNC Or SND_ALIAS)

,
Mike

 

[Richard Crist]

PlaySound Also Worked!

Actually, you could just use the PlaySound API. There may be built-in .Net methods as well (I dont know) but PlaySound works fine:

    Private Declare Function PlaySound Lib "winmm.dll" Alias "PlaySoundA" _
        (ByVal lpszName As String, ByVal hModule As Long, ByVal dwFlags As Long) As Long
    Private Const SND_ASYNC As Integer = &H1
    Private Const SND_ALIAS As Integer = &H10000

Then call:

Call PlaySound("C:\\Windows\\Media\\Tada.wav", 0, SND_ASYNC Or SND_ALIAS)

,
Mike

Using your code above as a starting point I was able to use PlaySound.

The former Beep routine beeps the pc internal speaker with the ability to control frequency and duration. Using Beep you can do cool things with several Beeps in a row with different frequencies and durations.

The PlaySound routine uses the pcs sound card. The example you gave (Tada.wav) gives the familiar ding sound. I converted the code above to C#. I looked around and found the definitions for the other SND_ parameters. And, as with the Beep, to use the DllImport option I had to include "using System.Runtime.InteropServices;" at the top of my source. My converted code with complete SND_ definitions is shown below.

Also, the original PlaySound I tried didnt do the SND_LOOP option. I found the PlaySoundA routine on the web and it does the SND_LOOP option.

Thank you so much to both of you, because I was getting no where without your help!

		// constants for use with PlaySound
		public const int SND_ALIAS = 0x10000;
			//lpszName is a string identifying the name of the system event sound to play. 
		public const int SND_ALIAS_ID = 0x110000;
			//lpszName is a string identifying the name of the predefined sound identifier to play. 
		public const int SND_APPLICATION = 0x80;
			//lpszName is a string identifying the application-specific event association sound to play. 
		public const int SND_ASYNC = 0x1;
			//Play the sound asynchronously -- return immediately after beginning to play the sound and have it play in the background. 
		public const int SND_FILENAME = 0x20000;
			//lpszName is a string identifying the filename of the .wav file to play. 
		public const int SND_LOOP = 0x8;
			//Continue looping the sound until this function is called again ordering the looped playback to stop. SND_ASYNC must also be specified. 
		public const int SND_MEMORY = 0x4;
			//lpszName is a numeric pointer refering to the memory address of the image of the waveform sound loaded into RAM. 
		public const int SND_NODEFAULT = 0x2;
			//If the specified sound cannot be found, terminate the function with failure instead of playing the SystemDefault sound. If this flag is not specified, the SystemDefault sound will play if the specified sound cannot be located and the function will return with success. 
		public const int SND_NOSTOP = 0x10;
			//If a sound is already playing, do not prematurely stop that sound from playing and instead return with failure. If this flag is not specified, the playing sound will be terminated and the sound specified by the function will play instead. 
		public const int SND_NOWAIT = 0x2000;
			//If a sound is already playing, do not wait for the currently playing sound to stop and instead return with failure. 
		public const int SND_PURGE = 0x40;
			//Stop playback of any waveform sound. lpszName must be an empty string. 
		public const int SND_RESOURCE = 0x4004;
			//lpszName is the numeric resource identifier of the sound stored in an application. hModule must be specified as that applications module handle. 
		public const int SND_SYNC = 0x0;
			//Play the sound synchronously -- do not return until the sound has finished playing. 

		//[DllImport("winmm.dll")]  // first usage
		//private extern static long PlaySound (string lpszName, long hModule, long dwFlags);  // first usage

		[DllImport("winmm.dll", EntryPoint="PlaySound")]  // found on web - works with SND_LOOP
		public static extern int PlaySoundA(string lpszName, int hModule, int dwFlags);  // found on web - works with SND_LOOP

		private void button1_Click(object sender, System.EventArgs e)
		{
			//PlaySound("C:\\Windows\\Media\\Tada.wav", 0, SND_ASYNC | SND_ALIAS);   // first usage
			PlaySoundA("C:\\Windows\\Media\\Tada.wav", 0, SND_ASYNC | SND_ALIAS | SND_LOOP); // PlaySoundA for SND_LOOP ability
			System.Threading.Thread.Sleep(5000);
			PlaySoundA("C:\\Windows\\Media\\Tada.wav", 0, 0);
		}