How do I turn on/off the beep in the terminal in Linux?

Question

In linux echo -e '\a' is one way you can alert the user with a beep.

• But if it isn't working how to enable or diagnose it?
• And if it is working how's the best way to quiet it.

(This was asked here but that question was closed.)

Answer 1

It's much easier to disable. Getting the beep to work can be harder.

Here are some things to look at.

• If using GNOME Terminal, Menu> Edit> Profile preferences> Terminal bell check box.
• If using GNOME ALSA Mixer under the tab for your sound driver> Beep column> check or uncheck the Mute box and set volume. (You might first have to show the Beep column with Menu> Edit> Sound Card Properties.)

For me (a notebook running Debian Stretch) these don't seem to matter:

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• set prefer-visible-bell on
• set prefer-visible-bell off

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• sudo modprobe -r pcspkr
• sudo modprobe pcspkr

Answer 2

I had some issues turning off the bell in xterm, to fully eliminate the sound on my system, Fedora 30, I replaced the in use alarm sound in /usr/share/sounds/gnome/default/alerts by an .ogg file with no sound.