Command Line Password Prompt in PHP

Question

I'm writing a command line tool to help my web app. It needs a password to connect to the service. I'd like the script to show a password prompt so I don't have to pass it as a command line argument.

That's easy enough, but I'd like it to not echo the password to the screen as it's typed. How can I do this with PHP?

Bonus points for doing it in pure PHP (no system('stty')) and replacing the characters with *.

EDIT:

The script will run on a unix like system (linux or mac). The script is written in PHP, and will most likely stay like that.

Also, for the record, the stty way of doing it is:

echo "Password: ";
system('stty -echo');
$password = trim(fgets(STDIN));
system('stty echo');
// add a new line since the users CR didn't echo
echo "\n";

I'd prefer to not have the system() calls in there.

Answer 1

Found on sitepoint.

function prompt_silent($prompt = "Enter Password:") {
  if (preg_match('/^win/i', PHP_OS)) {
    $vbscript = sys_get_temp_dir() . 'prompt_password.vbs';
    file_put_contents(
      $vbscript, 'wscript.echo(InputBox("'
      . addslashes($prompt)
      . '", "", "password here"))');
    $command = "cscript //nologo " . escapeshellarg($vbscript);
    $password = rtrim(shell_exec($command));
    unlink($vbscript);
    return $password;
  } else {
    $command = "/usr/bin/env bash -c 'echo OK'";
    if (rtrim(shell_exec($command)) !== 'OK') {
      trigger_error("Can't invoke bash");
      return;
    }
    $command = "/usr/bin/env bash -c 'read -s -p \""
      . addslashes($prompt)
      . "\" mypassword && echo \$mypassword'";
    $password = rtrim(shell_exec($command));
    echo "\n";
    return $password;
  }
}