ECHO statement

Syntax

ECHO {ON | OFF | expression}

Description

Use the ECHO statement to control the display of input characters on the screen.

If ECHO ON is specified, subsequent input characters are displayed, or echoed, on the screen. If ECHO OFF is specified, subsequent input characters are assigned to the INPUT statement variables but are not displayed on the screen.

The ability to turn off character display is useful when the keyboard is to be used for cursor movement or for entering password information. If expression evaluates to true, ECHO is turned ON. If expression evaluates to false, ECHO is turned OFF. If expression evaluates to the null value, it is treated as false, and ECHO is turned OFF.

Example

PROMPT ""
ECHO OFF
PRINT "ENTER YOUR PASSWORD"
INPUT PWORD
ECHO ON

This is the program output:

ENTER YOUR PASSWORD