What does the at sign mean in "@echo off "?

It seems like I remember the at sign as a reference call but I'm lost in this context. I'm just trying to write scripts or batch files to start or stop a service in windows.

Andrew 2013-10-23 10:36:38 Thank you guys Oron J 2013-09-10 10:24:55 Yep, Bruce got there before me... the @ means "do not display this line on the screen" and it's used mostly in batch files where ECHO is used to provide useful information to the user (if feedback's not an issue, it doesn't matter how much, or how little, guff is displayed). Bruce E 2013-09-09 20:29:37 By default, the echo feature is on in MS-DOS-based (and later, Windows) systems when executing a batch file. That means that every command issued in a batch file (and all of its output) would be echoed to the screen. By issuing, the 'echo off' command, this feature is turned off but as a result of issuing that command, the command itself will still show up on the screen. By including the '@' symbol in '@echo off', it will prevent the 'echo off' command from being seen on the screen.