To implement a status bar like below:
[========== ] 45%
[================ ] 60%
[==========================] 100%
There's a Python module that you can get from PyPI called progressbar that implements such functionality. If you don't mind adding a dependency, it's a good solution. Otherwise, go with one of the other answers.
A simple example of how to use it:
import progressbar
from time import sleep
bar = progressbar.ProgressBar(maxval=20, \
widgets=[progressbar.Bar('=', '[', ']'), ' ', progressbar.Percentage()])
bar.start()
for i in xrange(20):
bar.update(i+1)
sleep(0.1)
bar.finish()
To install it, you can use easy_install progressbar, or pip install progressbar if you prefer pip.