My hosts file (running XP) is in

C:WINDOWSsystem32driversetchosts

I can't remember where it is on Vista but it might be the same.

The purpose of this file is to explicitly associate human-readable names for computers with their IP addresses. Some anti-malware programs, such as Spybot Search and Destroy, will use this file as a trick to prevent you from connected to known malware servers.

Spybot has put hundreds of entries in mine, all pointing to the loopback address, 127.0.0.1. This means that if my browser should get tricked into attempting to go to these computers, by name, it will instead ask my own computer for whatever malware is being served, which, of course, will result in nothing bad happening. It's a rather ugly trick but it does work.

However, if part of this strategy is to also block 127.0.0.1, then all local communication will actually be prevented. Spybot commented out the one line that really matters in my hosts file:

127.0.0.1 localhost

It changed it to

#127.0.0.1 localhost

But it doesn't matter as my system is configured to allow communication to 127.0.0.1 and Poser doesn't actually use the word "localhost" when trying to connect its various pieces.

---

Renderosity forum reply notifications are wonky. If I read a follow-up in a thread, but I don't myself reply, then notifications no longer happen AT ALL on that thread. So if I seem to be ignoring a question, that's why. (Updated September 23, 2019)