Prefer ?* to hide passwords

It might be argued that a hidden string is more legible when using
?* as the hidden character instead of ?.
For example, the following strings have the same length:
"......"

"******"

It's slighly easier to visually count the number of characters in the second
string (Bug#32220).

* lisp/subr.el (read-passwd): Prefer ?* as default char instead of ?.
* doc/lispref/minibuf.texi (Reading a Password): Update manual.
; * etc/NEWS (Changes in Emacs 27.1): Announce the change.

1 files changed, 3 insertions, 0 deletions

diff --git a/etc/NEWS b/etc/NEWS
index 089fc4053b1..31ccb447362 100644
--- a/etc/NEWS
+++ b/etc/NEWS
@@ -92,6 +92,9 @@ the new version of the file again.)
 
 * Changes in Emacs 27.1
 
++++
+** The function 'read-passwd' uses '*' as default character to hide passwords.
+
 ---
 ** New variable 'xft-ignore-color-fonts'.
 Default t means don't try to load color fonts when using Xft, as they