My Alarm Clock 1.6 – Turn your Mac into an all-in-one alarm clock. October 31, 2013 My Alarm Clock turns your Mac into an alarm clock that sings your favorite tunes, a bedside clock with gorgeous themes and current weather information, and a sleep timer that lulls you to sleep at night!
How to set a recurring alarm clock on a Mac computer?
Today, computers are becoming a large part of our lives - for work, entertainment, and a helping hand with other casual duties. Minor features such as alarm clocks can be included by default and are popular with many users. If you have not yet used this feature, it can be difficult to set up. Even if you are familiar with the basic alarm function, there are other available features offered by default with Mac OS applications. Many users refer to the Mac App Store to download an alarm clock, unaware of the built-in one.
Together with Mac OS X Mavericks, Apple introduced the Calendar app, which is included with the operating system. It has a number of useful features, often unknown to users new to the Mac operating system. For example, the Calendar application allows you to set up the alarm clock and also offers other functions such as alarms for birthdays, meeting reminders, or one-time alarms for special events. In addition, this software provides a snooze feature, which repeats the alarm, delayed by 15 minutes. Since Apple products communicate with each other via the iCloud, all event reminders and alarms will be shown on any Mac OS or iOS device. In this article, we provide information on available Calendar app functions.
Table of Contents:
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Set up one-time alert
We will begin with the basics. First, set up a one-time alert with text and audio message. Launch the Calendar app, which you can find in your Dock or Launchpad. Alternatively, invoke Spotlight by pressing Command and Spacebar, and then type calendar.
Once the software has launched, double-click the day you wish to set an alarm. Set the name of the alarm by typing it in the New event text area.
Next, set up the date and time when the alert should start - to manage the details, simply click on them and choose from the list. Then click Alert and select Custom from the drop-down menu. In the first drop-down menu, choose the Message With Sound option, select the sound from the available sounds list in the second drop-down menu. Alternatively, select Open File and choose your desired audio file from the hard drive, which will play when the alarm goes off. Finally, set the time when you require the audio file or sound to play, by clicking on the last drop-down menu. There are a number options, some of which will require you to enter the number of minutes.
Set up events and birthday alerts
Calendar offers an event (such as birthday or important meeting) reminder, which will display a message, about the forthcoming event. To set up the alert, open the calendar application, click on Calendar from the menu at top of the screen, and choose Preferences. In the new window, select the Alerts tab, click on Events, and select the type of alert from the list - for example, at time of Event, or from five minutes to two days before event. Another feature, All Day Events, offers several types of alert. Click the drop-down menu and select options such as On day of event or maximum of one week before event. The last feature, birthdays alerts, allows you to choose the same types of alerts as simple events, however, birthdays are separated from other events and might contain a different type of alert.
Settle automatic launch of your Mac
You now know calendar functions, but of course they will not work if the Mac is turned off. To avoid this situation, set the Mac to start or wake automatically before you want it to behave like an alarm clock. To do this, open System preferences and choose Energy Saver. Click on Schedule.
Enable the Start up or wake checkbox and select the days you wish the Mac to automatically turn on from the drop-down menu. There are a number options such as weekdays, weekends, and every day. You can also choose a particular day of the week, however you cannot choose a number of separated days such as Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Despite this, you do not have to worry about receiving an alarm every day, since this step only defines times when your computer starts automatically. Note: although most recent Macs run on SSDs, they still require some time to completely load, so do not set the automatic turn on at the exact time you need an alarm. For example, if you need to wake up at 8:50 AM, set the time to turn the Mac on to 8:40 AM.
Your Mac will now start automatically, but will require you to enter password to stop the alarm sound. To avoid this frustrating situation, go to Users & Groups preferences under System Preferences. Click the Login Options benath the list of users.
To make changes, you must authenticate by clicking the lock icon in bottom left corner of the window and enter the password. Select your account from the drop-down menu beside Automatic login and enter the account password to confirm your action.
Use Automator to make your Mac act like alarm clock
Automator is a useful tool that allows you to create workflows for some basic actions without any programming experience. Simply select the desired actions from the built-in builder. Launch the software by using Spotlight or through Finder by going to the Applications folder. Once the tool has launched, click New Document and select Calendar Alarm as the type of your document. This particular workflow is triggered by an event in Calendar.
When you are familiar with the features of Calendar, expand them by using the Automator's workflow. In the left sidebar, all actions that Automator is able to perform are listed. In this case, we just need a few. The first action we will use is Find iTunes Items - to find it is easier through items in the list than using the search field. Once you see action, simply drag it to main workflow panel. For more detailed demonstration purposes we will poorly edit the action - command the Automator to find playlists rather than tracks, by changing the option in the drop-down menu. Next, type in the name or part of it into the text field and try out the workflow by clicking Run. Click the Results to check action's output.
This workflow will not play any music at this point. To finish the workflow, add one more action called Play iTunes Playlist. To add this action, simply drag it to main workflow panel.
Once you have created the workflow, click File in the menu at the top of the screen and select Save, or use the Command and S shortcut. Once you have saved the workflow, the Calendar app will be launched automatically and the event, created. The event will have default one-time event preferences, so update them to your desired options by the methods listed above.
Video Showing how to set an alarm clock on Mac
Wake Up Time turns your Mac into a full-fledged alarm clock. This can be especially useful if you keep your Mac by your bed at night. It can also be great if you are working a lot on your computer and need a little reminder to take breaks.
What is it and what does it do
Main Functionality
This application is meant to provide a simple alarm clock to those who need it. While having an alarm clock on their computer may not benefit everyone, this app is meant to provide a solid base for those who decide that such an app can be useful.
Pros
- Realistic and informative display
- Large, primary button to easily turn off alarm
- HUD display
- Customizable snooze time
- 24-hour mode
- Customizable alarm
Turn Your Mac Into A Spotify Alarm Clock Radio
Cons
- No multiple alarms
- Cannot customize sleep timer
- Not integrated with the top menu bar
- Will not wake the computer from sleep
Turn Your Mac Into A Spotify Alarm Clocks
Discussion
Wake Up Time can be an odd program because most people don’t ever think of using their Mac as an alarm clock. It’s actually a fantastic idea and can truly be useful. It works great after staying up late working on papers or projects. It allows you to just set your computer aside and go to sleep. It prevents you from having to struggle with your phone alarm or buy an obnoxious, physical alarm clock.
The features it provides are great and make you feel like all alarm clocks should be set up this way. The alarm clock will show you a HUD-display interface that looks exactly like a traditional alarm clock but with an elegant skin. The time will be displayed front and center with the option of a 24-hour format. It will also display a nice, big button that will allow you to control the alarming. You can also customize the alarm but choosing your own sounds or music and by adding effects like volume fading. In addition, you can customize the duration of the snoozes.
There are unfortunately some missing features in this seemingly simple application. For starters, you cannot set multiple alarms. This is incredibly inconvenient because sometimes you need to be woken up at different times and don’t want to reset the alarm every time. In addition, you cannot change the duration of the sleep timer, which can be very annoying if it takes you longer to fall asleep. If the developers were to add the ability to hide this program in the top bar, then that would be a big bonus seeing as this application doesn’t always have to be open.
However, the biggest missing feature of this application is the ability to wake the computer from sleep. This is a major blow because if you leave your computer open, your going to want to at least have it go to sleep in order to conserve power and resources. Your only options with this application are to either have it constantly display the alarm clock, or just turn off the display. Neither of these options will help you conserve power and forces your computer to remain active during the entire night.
Conclusion and download link
For the most part, this application does its job well. However, there are quite a few areas that need adjusting in order for this to be a fully functional alarm clock. The good news is that the developer has actually stated that some features will be added soon. But all of the shortcomings need to be adressed in order for this application to succeed The truth is, there isn’t a large demand for an application such as this, so in order to gain popularity, Wake Up Time has to be nearly perfect.
Price: Free
Version reviewed: 1.2.1
Supported OS: OS X 10.6 or later
Download size: 13mb