Does hosts file exist on the iPhone? How to change it? [closed]

Asked 8/1, 2010 at 15:27 Answered 12/12, 2011 at 19:14

113

I am developing an application that query to the server. In my Mac, I use the hosts file to change the dns to point to a local server within my local area network.

Now I need to test it with my iPhone, the problem is that my iPhone does not recognize that server due to the missing configuration for dns.

On my Mac or Windows, I simply add: 192.168.0.20 http://www.google.com to the hosts file.

Now how do I let my iPhone know the URL: http://www.google.com ?

Minuet answered 8/1, 2010 at 15:27 Comment(7)

Jailbreak your iPhone, download iFile, navigate to /etc/ and open the file called hosts in the text viewer. Now you can edit it. – Rafaelarafaelia 6/11, 2011 at 22:41

Local Development on iPhone with OSX and Charles Web Proxy deployfx.com/2011/08/… – Xenon 15/2, 2012 at 4:29

OSX iOS Simulator and update your /etc/hosts file. – Subservient 20/8, 2013 at 21:25

Alternatively: install Bonjour (sudo apt-get install avahi-daemon avahi-utils) and access via hostname.local on iphone/ipad – Arachnid 25/9, 2015 at 2:6

I was surprised not to see an answer like this one, which worked for me: https://mcmap.net/q/86830/-how-do-you-access-a-website-running-on-localhost-from-iphone-browser – Obau 25/1, 2017 at 16:44

When do we get to vote on moderator decisions? – Sometime 13/2, 2017 at 9:36

this is a legit question, the number of upvotes speaks for itself. – Heavyladen 31/8, 2020 at 17:16

This doesn't directly answer your question, but it does solve your problem...

What make of router do you have? Your router firmware may allow you to set DNS records for your local network. This is what I do with the Tomato firmware

Overrefinement answered 8/1, 2010 at 15:41 Comment(3)

thanks, this is what I did to solve the issue ;) – Minuet 22/1, 2010 at 16:43

I used this approach too, except I'm using pfsense. – Jalopy 9/4, 2013 at 21:39

how will it work, i too have same issue, i am on cisco wrt router – Sinless 1/5, 2014 at 11:52

Another option here is to have your iPhone connect via a proxy. Here's an example of how to do it with Fiddler (it's very easy):

http://conceptdev.blogspot.com/2009/01/monitoring-iphone-web-traffic-with.html

In that case any dns lookups your iPhone does will use the hosts file of the machine Fiddler is running on. Note, though, that you must use a name that will be resolved via DNS. example.local, for instance, will not work. example.xyz or example.dev will.

Outwardly answered 17/6, 2011 at 12:49 Comment(12)

This is the simplest solution. I should have thought of this!! – Nicolas 7/7, 2011 at 9:18

Awesome. This worked a treat for me! – Virginia 7/12, 2011 at 13:58

Same thing works great in osx, setup a HTTP proxy in network settings i.imgur.com/h5zEm.png – Leeannaleeanne 29/1, 2012 at 12:9

Local Development on iPhone with OSX and Charles Web Proxy deployfx.com/2011/08/… – Xenon 15/2, 2012 at 4:30

This is a great tool to have in the arsenal for any mobile app development - not just for DNS lookups – Capsular 11/6, 2012 at 17:30

On the Linux I use mitmproxy for the same thing and it doesn't need any configuration (except setting proxy on the iphone side ) – Rationale 18/7, 2012 at 10:42

This should be the correct answer! This actually solves the problem, and is an elegant solution! I love it. – Alethiaaletta 14/9, 2012 at 13:32

Unfortunately Fiddler is Windows-only, so you'll need a virtualized system running Windows if you're in a Mac-only shop. – Tactful 24/4, 2013 at 16:21

Great solution ! On Linux, you also have tinyproxy which is very simple to install and configure. – Premier 19/5, 2014 at 13:58

@JonathonHill: There's now a Mono build in beta. Worked on my Linux Mint 17 install. – Electroacoustics 18/6, 2015 at 10:7

Do I have to create/set the file whenever I switch to a different router in this solution? – Discourtesy 14/7, 2017 at 12:59

Any possibility to access sites ending with .local like example.local ? My setup has restriction and I have to use .local. – Ashlar 20/5, 2020 at 13:40

This doesn't directly answer your question, but it does solve your problem...

What make of router do you have? Your router firmware may allow you to set DNS records for your local network. This is what I do with the Tomato firmware

Overrefinement answered 8/1, 2010 at 15:41 Comment(3)

thanks, this is what I did to solve the issue ;) – Minuet 22/1, 2010 at 16:43

I used this approach too, except I'm using pfsense. – Jalopy 9/4, 2013 at 21:39

how will it work, i too have same issue, i am on cisco wrt router – Sinless 1/5, 2014 at 11:52

Not programming related, but I'll answer anyway. It's in /etc/hosts.

You can change it with a simple text editor such as nano.

(Obviously you would need a jailbroken iphone for this)

Showker answered 8/1, 2010 at 15:29 Comment(7)

You can't use nano on a vanilla iphone to directly get to /etc/hosts. I would assume is about an app that would be distributed, in which case you can't mess with files outside your sandbox. – Benedikta 8/1, 2010 at 15:32

@Jaanus: of course I meant with a jailbroken iphone. And he never said anything about an app being redistributed; he simply mentioned he needed to test it on his iphone which had a dns problem. – Showker 8/1, 2010 at 15:33

I don't understand the downvotes. The answer is technically correct and well written. – Showker 8/1, 2010 at 15:37

I'll restore some karma for the edit; if the down-votes were used because of the implicit 'for distributed app' then while I can understand them, I think the downvoters should've left a comment to explain that. – Marnie 8/1, 2010 at 15:47

I presume he only needs to change the hosts file so he can test his app. Once tested, it shouldnt need the hosts file changed. Perfectly acceptable to recommend jailbreaking here! – Clapperclaw 8/1, 2010 at 15:57

Can this answer be updated? I did not find this directory on iOS 8... – Kordofanian 30/7, 2016 at 20:18

@DaMaxContent: The directory is still valid for every version of iOS, as this is part of the POSIX-API afaik. However, the /etc/-directory is often a symbolic link. Try navigating to /private/etc/hosts, if you cannot access /etc/hosts directly – Empiric 5/11, 2016 at 13:33

I just edited my iPhone's 'hosts' file successfully (on Jailbroken iOS 4.0).

Installed OpenSSH onto iPhone via Cydia
Using a SFTP client like FileZilla on my computer, I connected to my iPhone
- Address: [use your phone's IP address or hostname, eg. simophone.local]
- Username: root
- Password: alpine
Located the /etc/hosts file
Made a backup on my computer (in case I want to revert my changes later)
Edited the hosts file in a decent text editor (such as Notepad++). See here for an explanation of the hosts file.
Uploaded the changes, overwriting the hosts file on the iPhone

The phone does cache some webpages and DNS queries, so a reboot or clearing the cache may help. Hope that helps someone.

Simon.

Ageold answered 20/9, 2010 at 3:8 Comment(3)

@Simon I followed the same steps, but it didn't work. Then i tried to change encoding settings, and got it! You have to convert your host file to ANSI in Notepad++ before you save it. For whom failed to get the host file working; click "Convert to ANSI" under "Encoding" menu. – Debenture 26/9, 2010 at 12:14

You can also use the iFile app from Cydia to edit the hosts file on your device without having to use a computer. Ad@m – Pontiac 17/6, 2011 at 13:35

.. And change the default password from alpine to something else! – Ss 5/11, 2012 at 9:5

It might exist, but you cannot change it on a non-jailbreaked iPhone.

Assuming that your development webserver is on a Mac, why don't you simply use its Bonjour name (e.g. MyMac.local.) instead of myrealwebserverontheinternet.com?

Calx answered 8/1, 2010 at 15:37 Comment(1)

all the web services exist in a server within my LAN network. I have a domain name and I would like to map my domain name to this server as well. and immagine that someone gives you an address for all of his webservices, he ask you to query these services using this address, he can show you how to add hosts file to mac, windows, but not iphone :-s – Minuet 8/1, 2010 at 15:54

In case anybody else falls onto this page, you can also solve this by using the Ip address in the URL request instead of the domain:

NSURL *myURL = [NSURL URLWithString:@"http://10.0.0.2/mypage.php"];

Then you specify the Host manually:

NSMutableURLRequest *request = [NSMutableURLRequest requestWithURL:myURL];
[request setAllHTTPHeaderFields:[NSDictionary dictionaryWithObjectAndKeys:@"myserver",@"Host"]];

As far as the server is concerned, it will behave the exact same way as if you had used http://myserver/mypage.php, except that the iPhone will not have to do a DNS lookup.

100% Public API.

Millisent answered 12/12, 2011 at 19:14 Comment(3)

However this will only work for the first request, if the mypage.php does any other request to myserver then the app won't do the conversion. – Bastard 12/4, 2014 at 3:49

This approach is good if you don't intend to use cookie. – Conidium 9/10, 2014 at 15:0

Nah. This didn't work either. We are using SSL Pinning, so domain mismatch messed it up: '017-07-13 10:21:42.244723-0400 ApperName[1015:449748] libMobileGestalt MobileGestaltSupport.m:153: pid 1015 (ApperName) does not have sandbox access for frZQaeyWLUvLjeuEK43hmg and IS NOT appropriately entitled 2017-07-13 10:21:42.244886-0400 UnionBank[1015:449748] libMobileGestalt MobileGestalt.c:550: no access to InverseDeviceID (see <rdar://problem/11744455>)' – Silicle 14/7, 2017 at 14:22

Don't change the DNS on the phone. Instead, connect with wifi to the local network and you are all set.

At my office, we have internal servers with internal DNS that are not exposed to the Internet. I just connect with iPhone to the office wifi and can then access them fine.

YMMV, but instead of configuring the phone DNS, it feels to me that just setting up local internal DNS and wifi is a cleaner and easier solution.

Benedikta answered 8/1, 2010 at 19:36 Comment(0)

No, an iPhone application can only change stuff within its own little sandbox. (And even there there are things that you can't change on the fly.)

Your best bet is probably to use the servers IP address rather than hostname. Slightly harder, but not that hard if you just need to resolve a single address, would be to put a DNS server on your Mac and configure your iPhone to use that.

Sadducee answered 8/1, 2010 at 15:37 Comment(0)

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