What is loopback pseudo-interface?

[Squa190]

Well I've done some limited searching on the net and I only get
instances of people using the term when defining some network problem. I
couldn't find a description of exactly what is is? Anyone?

[John Thompson]

Post by Squa190
Well I've done some limited searching on the net and I only get
instances of people using the term when defining some network problem. I
couldn't find a description of exactly what is is? Anyone?

It's a virtual interface on your own computer, by convention assigned to
127.0.0.1

If you have a hosts file, you may find this address assigned to the name
"localhost" and/or "localhost.localdomain"

You can test it by e.g. "ping 127.0.0.1" or "ping localhost"

You can put it to use running e.g. a caching nameserver on your computer
to speed up DNS lookups, a web proxy to cache (squid), filter (privoxy),
or anonymize (tor) your web traffic, &etc.