On Fri, Dec 19, 2025 at 08:50:33 -0700, Stan Marsh wrote: > But it is the sort of thing that would be nice to have implemented at > the global level - i.e., if Unix could be redesigned so that whenever > you are typing in "no echo" mode, it echoes back something (like "*").
It would need to be opt-in. No-echo mode is often used for applications where single keypresses activate menu items, or video games, where you wouldn't want extraneous dots or asterisks appearing at random spots on the terminal. > But it is way too late for that, of course. Indeed. But I really think this belongs at the application level, not at the terminal driver level. The cases where you want to echo back something other than what was typed (but not remain silent) are so exceedingly rare that you can't justify clogging up the terminal driver with that.
