this was suggested on the forums. at least parts of this (a separate, local, guaranteed alarm not tied to the network in any way) I'd been considering already.


Alarm Clock Suggestion 
I remember old time clock radios that had the following feature.
When an alarm was set the following occurred.
a. About 5 minutes before the alarm the radio turned on and began to
play a station as a preset volume.
b. At the alarm time , a real alarm went off (buzzer) that was intended
to wake the person up. The radio station continued to play.
c. At that point the user could hit the snooze button and the radio
station would continue to play. 
d. After the snooze time, the process would repeat until the alarm was
turned off. Even then the radio played until shut off.

I think this dual system could be a big hit for some. I like to listen
to a news station in the morning when I wake up. But sometimes I fall
back asleep and need a real alarm with snooze to make sure I get up.
Your various alarm sounds that ramp up would be fine if played in loop.
Since this is a Linux system it seems that it could provide both
services. 

1. A local guaranteed alarm sound would solve a reliability problem and
have no network dependency. 
2. An auto on radio tied to the alarm time would be a big plus. An
option to not have alarm go on would also give folks a way to just have
the radio turn on.

Thanks for reviewing this idea.