How about allowing bots/spiders?

I have 2 restricted areas.
1 is solely for moderators, so that we can discuss issues regarding the message board such as user bans and other stuff that NO ONE but moderators and admins should see.

The other one is for XML development and even some mods don't have access to that area as it is only for the XML developers.

In any of those cases if a spider had access to those forums, it would defeat the purpose of restricting them completely. What it sounds like is you want to dangle a carrot in front of non-members by having a restricted area that they can't visit, but one that they benefits from search engine registration. No web board comes with that feature, so if you want it, you will have to leartn WWF (or some other board) well enough to build that mod, pay some one to build the mod for you, or wait until someone develops it for themselves and releashes it as a mod. Personally, I don't think any one would ever release it as a mod there is too much work and done incorrectly would add a security hole to WWF. Even done correctly it could add a security hole to WWF.

If you believe the WWF has "too much security for 99% of web stuff", then you have done NOTHING that needed security. Security is the one of the largest issues on the web and if you can give your users a sense of security, you have gone a long way towards insuring repeat visitors.

I'm having a terribly hard time coming to grips with the absolute inability of anyone to understand the basic concept. This isn't that tough to grasp...

There are times when security is important, and other times when security is not. When it is NOT critical, then why not do it?

And as for posting in other places in the forum, that doesn't work because the content that people are looking for will not be indexed by the bot.

And yes. I have done a lot of security work. I've done B2C webstores and B2B sites as well. And I have NEVER had any problems.

You're all thinking about this in a far to "programmer" like manner. 99.99% of surfers cannot even imagine that when they click the search engine link and get a "Please register" notice, that they can get the actual results from the search engine cache. You're overestimating the general internet population. Most people don't know what the "Home" key is for, much less what a cache is.

The point is, that in order to make yourself visible on the web for people to find out who you are, they have to find out through "indirect means", i.e. search engines, word of mouth, etc. Search engines are by far the most effective way to "advertise" yourself.

A general forum with content restricted to registered members only is not uncommon. There are lots like it. The reason being that they want you to sign up and participate. Once you are signed up, you are far more likely to post. It is generally bad practise to allow anonymous posting because that attracts spammers and other lowlifes.

As for security, it would not add any kind of a hole at all. [ See above. ] It should ONLY be added to portions of a forum where you want people to register. e.g. Imagine a "car audio" forum about subwoofers and all the latest gadgets. How many car audio buffs do you think are accomplished programmers? A lot less than the number of people who visit WWF I would imagine.

As for IP based security... it works. Spoofing is only useful for DOS or DDOS. I'm a whitehat... I'm not interested in blackhat stuff, although I am confident I could. (I've hacked sites by 'accident' on more than one occasion - never doing any damage of course... purely curiousity.)

I'm going to go beat my head against the wall for a bit...

But before I do, let me just state that season 6, "Once More with Feeling" is the absolute best Buffy episode ever  

Spike wrote: First he'll kill her Then I'll save her ... No, I'll save her Then I'll kill her!

Willow wrote: I think this line's mostly filler