WARNING: This script will overwrite your /etc/hosts file. Use at your own risk. If you break your hosts file it ain't my fault. I suggest you read the source in addition to the documentation to get the full picture!

This script assumes you have 3 existing files.

• /etc/hosts-dev - Any local domains you use for development
• /etc/hosts-clean - A clean or vanilla hosts file copy from the OS
• /etc/hosts-block - Any domains you want to deny

In both hosts-clean and hosts-block you will want to add this line somewhere --dont touch this line, ya dingus--. This line will be replaced by the contents of hosts-dev.

You will probably want aliases like this:

alias hostsblock="sudo /usr/local/bin/hosts-helper.sh block"
alias hostsreset="sudo /usr/local/bin/hosts-helper.sh default"

Now you can use hostsblock and hostsreset to toggle domain denial. For me this is very helpful because I have 60k~ domains in my blocklist. If someone sends me a silly thing on Twitter I can quickly and temporarily allow it.

Why not just use ublock origin or something then...??? Because that only blocks domains in the browser. Hosts files block all sorts of naughty stuff in native & electron apps as well :)

Thanks to Kyle Tucker for the help with sed!