This might be somewhat of a silly question but, does connecting to the localhost
or 127.0.0.1
actually initiate the network connection to the router and then comes back as a received signal or does it bypass the network altogether and just achieves the same effect by mimicking a network in software?
2 Answers
…does connecting to the
localhost
or127.0.0.1
actually initiate the network connection to the router and then comes back as a received signal or does it bypass the network altogether and just achieves the same effect by mimicking a network in software?
When you connect to localhost
/127.0.0.1
that is strictly a local connection on your local machine managed by the local OS. It never connects to an external router or device to achieve connectivity.
But when you say “…mimicking a network in software…” that is not exactly right. A system does not “mimick” a network when using localhost
/127.0.0.1
; networking functionality that would exist outside your OS system exists naturally as a part of the core OS on your system when using localhost
/127.0.0.1
.
The whole reason that localhost
/127.0.0.1
is considered a loopback connection is exactly that: A strictly local connection that feeds on itself but ultimately uses the same exact protocol and network structures a supposed “real” network does. A loopback connection is designed for testing and debugging—and sometimes local application needs—so it never “mimics” anything; it is what it is which is a network connection.
And for what it's worth, some software such as Firefox have deliberately used “acts as a server” processes that connect to an application created server reachable on localhost
/127.0.0.1
as part of it’s normal operations. And many RESTful API-based pieces of server software make use of local loopback to have a front-end layer of their core code talk back to a locally-based RESTful API for core operations.
It bounces back to your machine, does not reach the external router, in other words, it does half of the journey in the OSI layer and returns.