Password prompt with mask

[Neuberger, Sheldon N.]

> Could I write my own if one does not exist?

Take a look at the getpass.py module. It's very short. The windows
version of the getpass function can be trivially modified to echo
something. The unix version is just as short but a bit more
complicated.

def win_getpass(prompt='Password: ', stream=None):
    """Prompt for password with echo off, using Windows getch()."""
    if sys.stdin is not sys.__stdin__:
        return default_getpass(prompt, stream)
    import msvcrt
    for c in prompt:
        msvcrt.putch(c)
    pw = ""
    while 1:
        c = msvcrt.getch()
        if c == '\r' or c == '\n':
            break
        if c == '\003':
            raise KeyboardInterrupt
        if c == '\b':
            pw = pw[:-1]
        else:
            pw = pw + c
    msvcrt.putch('\r')
    msvcrt.putch('\n')
    return pw