PHP, AJAX - Chatroom Beep?

[rickpick77665]

I built a chatroom with PHP Ajax and everything is working perfectly, but I want to send a beep to everyone in the chat room when someone sends a new message.  I tried to google it, but I didn't really come up with anything.

Can someone point me in the right direction to do this?

Thanks!

[Guest]

It is not advisable, to say the least.

You will have browser compatibility issues, you will have to use third party technologies like Java Applets or Flash documents.

Besides, users will find it disturbing to have beeping sounds all over the place (I would ).

If you really need to get your users' attention on every single chat entry, you can use Javascript's native alert() function. It will play the system's default "alert" sound. But users will need to click OK everytime.

As I said, my advice would be just don't do it.

[Guest]

Well I need something to get the attention of members when someone sends a message.  Is there another solution you can offer?

[Lon_Winters]

Is this the type of chat room where there will be constant activity or just occasionally like a chat support feature?  If it's the latter, then i can see why you would need an alert. I think most of those just activate a system sound.

Another way would be to do it visually, a subtle light flashing or something like that.