Parallels Network Setup -- Localhost goes to host computer

Question

I've got a local webapp that runs via Tomcast and Eclipse. Big chunks of it don't function well or properly when not accessing them from the localhost domain (for security reasons I am assuming, not totally sure).

I have Parallels installed on my OS X machine and I'd like to be able to type 127.0.0.1 into my Internet Explorer browser and have the website load.

What can I do to accomplish this?

Answer 1

You can add an entry to your hosts file. I would recommend using something other than localhost if possible because I don't know what this will do to your system. You'll be trying this at your own risk I'm afraid.

For Windows, open notepad and open C:\windows\system32\drivers\etc\hosts. In there change the ip address of localhost to that of your OS X machine (If you're not on XP you'll need to run the command prompt elevated).

Then you should be able to run ipconfig /flushdns and give it a go in IE.

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An alternative method (as your target is OS X) is to use some form of SSH and port forwarding. If you enable SSH access on your OS X box, and then run PuTTY on your Windows box there is an option to forward the port while you have a connection open. The source port wants to be 80 and then fill in the address of your OSX box below that and hit Add.