When developing websites and web applications, you will often have a local environment set up for testing in your browser. But what if you want to test it on another machine or device on your local network?

Chances are, the hostname of your computer won’t work as a valid virtual host on a mobile device (and some computers). Additionally, you might have multiple projects on the go that all need unique virtual host names to operate properly.

This problem used to be solved by the “hosts” file (in /etc/hosts on Linux/Mac and C:\Windows\System32\Drivers\Etc\hosts on Windows), but there’s a better way! You can use IP reflection services or wildcard DNS records to let you use nearly any virtual host name you want.

Full article here:
End the Tyranny of hosts files! (whateverthing.com)