What would be the Windows batch equivalent for HTML's input type=“password”?

Question

I need to get authentication credentials from the users within a Windows script but the classic \"first Google result\" approach:

SET /P USR=Username: 
SET /         


        

Answer 1

You may use ReadFormattedLine subroutine for all kind of formatted input. For example, the commands below read an username and password of 8 characters each, display asterisks in the screen, and continue automatically with no need to press Enter:

call :ReadFormattedLine USR="********" /M "Username: "
call :ReadFormattedLine PWD="********" /M "Password: "

Or in a different way:

call :ReadFormattedLine nameAndPass="******** / ********" /M "Enter Username / Password: "

In previous example, when the user completed the username, the subroutine display the slash and read the password; if the user delete characters, the slash is also deleted automatically.

This subroutine is written in pure Batch so it does not require any additional program, and it allows several formatted input operations, like read just numbers, convert letters to uppercase, etc. You may download ReadFormattedLine subroutine from Read a line with specific format.