Arduino "Ports" Suddenly grayed out

Using Arduino IDE 1.x
22

gdsports:
I noticed the IDE accesses api-builder.arduino.cc on startup (thank you wireshark) so I blocked access to this host. I added an entry to /etc/hosts like this to blacklist the host.

127.0.0.1       api-builder.arduino.cc

Now the IDE starts up with the serial ports listed immediately without having to disconnect the network cable.

Perhaps something has changed on api-builder.arduino.cc.

Thank you very much for this, gets me going on a new IDE again. Hopefully someone gets to the bottom of what is happening, and takes away this unnecessary communication as well.