Cannot edit hosts file. Please help

Discussion in 'Mac OS X Lion (10.7)' started by Silas1066, Aug 25, 2011.

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  1. Silas1066, Aug 25, 2011

    Silas1066 macrumors regular

    Joined:
    Nov 1, 2009
    #1
    I need to use a hosts file because the Cisco AnyConnect VPN client won't allow me to resolve internal DNS names.

    When I do a

    sudo vi /private/etc/hosts

    I get an "empty" hosts file. I try to edit anyway, but when I try to save I get

    E166: Can't Open Linked File For Editing

    wtf? Linked where?

    any advice would be welcome.
     
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  2. nebo1ss, Aug 25, 2011

    nebo1ss macrumors 68030

    Joined:
    Jun 2, 2010
    #2
    If google "editing host file on a mac" you will find your answer.
     
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  3. Silas1066, Aug 25, 2011

    Silas1066 thread starter macrumors regular

    Joined:
    Nov 1, 2009
    #3
    I have already gone through dozens of pages of documentation -nothing has worked

    If I do a ls -la in the /etc/ directory, I see

    lrwxr-xr-x 1 root wheel 18 Jan 13 2010 hosts -> /etc/gasmask/hosts

    there is some kind of link

    but /etc/gasmask doesn't exist or cannot be accessed
     
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  4. tygrubb, Aug 25, 2011

    tygrubb macrumors regular

    Joined:
    Jun 23, 2010
    #4
    In case things changed with Lion, I tried the usual way of editing the hosts file.

    Code:
    sudo nano /etc/hosts
    and it worked as usual. Maybe something got borked on your particular install? Good luck tracking it down. "/etc/hosts" is supposed to be symlinked to "/private/etc/hosts"; if the latter for you is symlinked to something else, me wonders if there possibly be some malware afoot.
     
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  5. sidewinder, Aug 25, 2011

    sidewinder macrumors 68020

    sidewinder

    Joined:
    Dec 10, 2008
    Location:
    Northern California
    #5
    You obviously had installed "Gas Mask" at some point. Who know how you fix what that software did. Try contacting them:

    http://code.google.com/p/gmask/

    S-
     
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