Meaning of "echo."

[tomkaz]

What is the meaning of "echo."?  I cannot find this anywhere.  I know it does not print the ".".

In general, is there a place where the functions of non-alphabetical characters  are listed?  For example "@", ">" (used in redirection), etc.

I have a copy of Peter Norton's DOS 5 Guide.  It has a lot of information, but not on any DOS commands after 1991.  Any good recent book on DOS?  This site is very good, but I have trouble searching through it.

Tom

[dbam]

echo. is for inserting blank lines, mainly for formatting purposes or enhancing readability.

[Squashman]

http://www.robvanderwoude.com/bht.php#Strip

[tomkaz]

Thanks dbam and Squashman for the answer and information about Rob Vanderwoude's web site.

Tom