"hosts" file: What is it for?

[khonjo]

Could anyone explain what the "hosts" file is for? I reviewed the contents but could not understand. The file appears to be in W7, Vista, XP, etc.

[CoffeeFiend]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hosts_%28file%29

[khonjo]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hosts_%28file%29

Thanks for your quick response.　I will peruse the reference with great interest. Thanks again.

[Tarun]

Also worth reading so you don't misuse the Hosts file like some sites recommend: http://wiki.lunarsoft.net/wiki/Blocking_Malware_and_Advertisements_Safely

[gosh]

the hosts file just lets you statically assign ip addresses to friendly names. LMhosts is for computers, it stands for lan manager hosts, but i just think of it as local machine hosts. Unless you have a specific reason for editing it you should just leave it alone.