Hosts Manager

Hosts Manager for Access 97 - is a program made in MS Access that imports/exports and manages the Windows Hosts file. You will need MS Access to use this program. I probably won't update the 97 version since I've upgraded to Access 2000 and don't have Access 97 on my computer anymore.

Hosts Manager for Access 2000 - latest version (31 March 2003). Click here for Hosts Manager with Installer. Those upgrading should use this link. It contains only the updated .mde file. Screenshot

New features in the 2000 version are:
Group Manager now part of the main screen for easy access, auto finds back-end database so no more relinking of tables.

Features:

• Import/Export of Windows Hosts file
  (duplicates not imported)
• Creates backup of hosts file "hosts.bak" before exporting
• Auto-grouping of imported hosts
• Enable/disable Hosts individually or by group
• Switch between using localhost IP addresses 127.0.0.1 or 0.0.0.0 easily
  (other IP addresses in the Hosts list will not be affected)

Here is a place where you can learn more about the Hosts file:
http://accs-net.com/hosts/

And for a pre-compiled Hosts file for ad-blocking:
http://www.smartin-designs.com/downloads.htm

The links are courtesy of Mona from the Proxomitron Mailing List. Thanks Mona. :)

Instructions:

The following are instructions for the not-so-obvious features of the program (if you don't normally work with MS Access). The rest of the interface should be self-explanatory, especially after a few experimentations. If the button icons are confusing you, put the mouse over one and wait for the tool-tip to appear to see the description.

The first time you run Hosts Manager (for Access 97, Access 2000 is not affected), it will fail to find the database. Click on "Relink Tables" (button with the hammer and wrench icon) then quit the program. The next time you enter Hosts Manager, it should work properly.

To add a new host on the list

• click on the >* button on the bottom of the table.
• enter the required details (if the GroupID is left blank, it will be automatically filled in (Access 2000 version))

To delete a host

• select the row by clicking on the left-most column, or select more than one row by dragging the mouse over several rows
• press the Delete key on your keyboard or right-click with the mouse on the selected area and select "Delete record"

To filter the list of hosts

• right-click on the GroupID field and select "Filter for"
• Enter the keyword you want to search for. You can use * and ? as wildcards
• experiment with the other filter options available through the right-click menu

To enable/disable groups

• Click on the Group Manager button (Access2000 version does not require this first step)
• Double-click on a group or select a group then click on the Toggle Group Status button

To decrease the database size

• When you delete data in a database, space is not automatically given back until you "compact" it. You can find the command to compact the database in Tools menu > Database utilities. Performance improves after compaction.

  Some deletes are done during import of the hosts file so if you used the import button a lot of times, you may want to compact the database. Since the data is stored on a separate database file, HostsMgr_be.mdb, you must open that database and run the compact command from there, or better yet, use the "Compact Hosts Database" shortcut created by the intallation program. During my testing, while using the host list from www.smartin-designs.com, the database grew to a massive 8Mb. Compacting brought it down to less than 1.5Mb. The Access2000 version has a feature that compacts a database upon closing. I've moved the work table over to the .mde file to take advantage of this feature so that there will be less need to compact HostsMgr_be.mdb.

Note:

Only PC-formatted text files are supported (i.e. each line contains a carriage return and linefeed). If you are using a UNIX-formatted Host file, you'll get an error about trying to insert text that is longer than the field. You may also encounter Hosts files that are part PC and part UNIX-formatted. These typically create weird entries that look like "0     www.someplace.com". To fix these problems, use a text editor that will let you open the Hosts file and resave it in PC format, before importing it into Hosts Manager.

To Do:

• Make a VB version of this program with auto-compaction on exit

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