@Mars Thanks for the directions to
https://github.com/rejetto/hfs2/discussions/For sure, a forum with one niche topic has a huge disproportion of bots to people; therefore, I agree that a github discussion area is more sustainable, if only because github has a great many more topics and therefore a more favorable proportion of people because of that.
I guess there's only about 2000 HFS2X servers. I will try to remember to put a getting started note in the zip. According to my server's download logs, there are daily downloads of updated HFS2X, by real people, but not in large numbers.
The uses for HFS2X are niche: The main specialty is to catalog large numbers of files any way you want to.
So far as I know, HFS2X is the only server using its own code as the distribution server on Windows, without a CDN buffer.
At home, there are usually 5000 bots per day and that doesn't have much effect. However, forum software is a much different case; and, I know that dd-wrt forum (another single-topic stand-alone forum) is also going through some difficulties with bot traffic vs proportion of real people. I do need mention one thing about putting a wall up; because that is never actually a wall--it is a box. Indeed, these days, it is probably necessary to relocate forums to a more conglomerate arrangement with more topics on the site also causing a more favorable proportion of real people traffic.
I have noticed several companies hosting bots in private while advertising defense against bots in public. So, I can't imagine the frustration of hosting a forum on the same services that power most of the bots. I wonder if there are some screening filters available?