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Editing the Host file with Windows 7

After upgrading to Office 2010 I noticed I could no longer get a Record History box to come up after printing a mail merge document in Sage ACT.  This is how it has worked forever.  I did some research and found one of the solutions was to ensure that a line was on the Hosts file in Windows.  Microsoft had sent out an update to "protect" computers from malware and in the process commented out a line that ACT needed to make the Office and ACT connection work.

So, armed with this information I went out to edit the Hosts file located in the c:\windows\system32\drivers\etc folder.  I opened it using Notepad, made the correct and attempted to save the file.  That's when Windows 7 decided to "help me" and protect me from malicious activity - even though I was the one creating the activity.  Sigh.

Once again I went to my tool of choice - Google - and searched for a solution.  It turns out you have to open the file as an administrator.  Here's what you need to do.

Enter NOTEPAD on the Start run box., right click on  NOTEPAD and choose RUN AS ADMINISTRATOR.  Now you can edit the file, remove the # from the 127.0.0.1 localhost line, and get the RECORD HISTORY box back.

Hope this helps someone else who gets stuck trying to save changes to the Hosts file.

Patricia Egen Consulting, LLC

803 Creek Overlook, Chattanooga, TN 37415
Main office: 423-875-2652 • Arizona office: 480-788-7504 • Florida office: 754-300-2827
support@egenconsulting.com