Learned from here: Progressive Dots, this is a MSFTer who developing LiveMesh.

set /p CRLF=.<NUL

try this in command window, you will get a ”." output.  "set /p" is used for get a input with a specified prompt, "<NUL" make it return immediately, so "set /p CRLP=.<NUL" generate a dot without carriage return.

It’s a good trick, but as always, I hate .BAT files…