nhamann comments on Anti-akrasia remote monitoring experiment - Less Wrong
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For which versions of Windows does this happen? I'm running Windows XP and I also use my hosts file to block time-wasting websites, but I don't ever get any warnings when I edit my hosts file in Notepad. This makes the hosts file not so inconvenient, because all you have to do is (Windows key) + R > type in "cmd" and hit enter, and in command line type: "edit c:\windows\system32\drivers\etc\hosts" and you're done.
This can be done in about 15 seconds, unfortunately, and having the line "#127.0.0.1 www.facebook.com" in my current hosts file is a testament to that fact ("#" comments everything out after it on that line).
Uh, I guess that my advice won't work for programmers and admins then. I'm using Windows 7 under a non-admin / restricted account with UAC set to its default setting, level 3, and I don't use command-line to edit. I do it the normal way :) -- I double-click it, it asks me for an admin password, then to chose a program to open it, I chose Notepad, edit it, it won't let me save, I save to Desktop, then close Notepad and copy the file over, it asks me to copy or replace etc. etc.
BTW I just tried "edit c:\windows\system32\drivers\etc\hosts" in Win7 under both admin and non-admin accounts (had to replace 'edit' with 'notepad'). It indeed opened the file but it won't let me save the edits afterwards -- probably due to Windows File Protection.
I've actually got mine pinned on the taskbar. ;)
Useful for web development... I redirect to my linux VM.