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-- Portable password input</TITLE>
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<H1><A NAME="SECTION008500000000000000000">
6.5 <tt class=module>getpass</tt>
         -- Portable password input</A>
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<P>
The <tt class=module>getpass</tt> module provides two functions:

<P>
<dl><dt><b><a name="l2h-1064"><tt class=function>getpass</tt></a></b> (<big>[</big><var>prompt</var><big>]</big>)
<dd>
  Prompt the user for a password without echoing.  The user is
  prompted using the string <var>prompt</var>, which defaults to
  <tt>'Password: '</tt>.
  Availability: Macintosh, Unix, Windows.
</dl>

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<dl><dt><b><a name="l2h-1065"><tt class=function>getuser</tt></a></b> ()
<dd>
  Return the ``login name'' of the user.
  Availability: Unix, Windows.

<P>
This function checks the environment variables <span class=envvar><a name="l2h-1066">$LOGNAME</a></span>,
  <span class=envvar><a name="l2h-1067">$USER</a></span>, <span class=envvar><a name="l2h-1068">$LNAME</a></span> and <span class=envvar><a name="l2h-1069">$USERNAME</a></span>, in order, and
  returns the value of the first one which is set to a non-empty
  string.  If none are set, the login name from the password database
  is returned on systems which support the <tt class=module><a href="module-pwd.html">pwd</a></tt> module,
  otherwise, an exception is raised.
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