Sitemapper's URL field seems to demand a page already on the web. How can I sitemap a site I'm developing on my hard drive ?

Looks like you can't do that, since the Sitemapper wants to have a valid url including the http://

To do that, install a Web server on your local computer and then enter in the URL http://localhost or http://ipaddress

You could sitemap a site on your hard drive in previous versions; it would allow you to browse to the sites home page. This is a major oversight in the current version. I need this ability and am very unhappy about this. I've already installed the new version over the old not realizing that feature had been removed.

This was not an over sight, this was done on purpose. Our software is designed to mimic a search engine when mapping your Website. This used to be a feature in the old version but we were actually doing this incorrectly which is why it was corrected in version 5.0

I personally can't see any reason or benefit to building a sitemap locally as it sort of defeats the purpose of the software.

And that is such a wonderful feature too because it not only serves as a search function, but also helps with SEO.

Local server is a great tool. Here are the two best

http://www.wampserver.com/ (I use this one)

and

http://www.apachefriends.org/en/xampp.html