Re: How big can HOSTS be?

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Ken, very informative post! I was wondering how to enter a URL to speed
access. In my current HOSTS the format to BLOCK is:

0 whateveraddress.com

I do not use the standard 0.0.0.0, found one zero works fine and helps
keeps file size down

What format is required to make access faster?

Thanks
Vic
___

"Ken Blake, MVP" <kblake@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:i3qit3ln148qmontfqpbkmc62phl8cop3f@xxxxxxxxxx
On Thu, 13 Mar 2008 08:02:30 -0500, "Vic" <nospam@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:

I didn't know the HOSTS file could be used to speed things up, I've
only
used it to block addresses. Could you please explain how an entry
can be
used to speed things up?




Although people think of the URL as the address of a web site, the
real address is an IP address, a number in the form 123.456.789.

The URL is just an easily-remembered shortcut to get you to the IP
address. To translate from the URL that you type in your browser to
the actual IP address, your browser goes out to a special web site
caused a DNS server. The URL is looked up there and the DNS server
returns the IP address that the browser then loads.

That's a two-step process that takes time. The primary purpose of the
Host file is not to block addresses, but to speed up that DNS lookup.
The Hosts file essentially asks like a local DNS server for web sites
you frequently visit. If the browser can find the IP address it needs
there, it's much faster than going to a DNS server to get it.

Secondarily, the Hosts file can be used to block addresses, but that's
not it's primary purpose.

--
Ken Blake, Microsoft MVP - Windows Desktop Experience
Please Reply to the Newsgroup


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