Am I right in thinking that if a forum is closed to guests' (they can't read or view it,) then Google can't see it either ? Ie It can only be viewed by members?

Search engines can only see what guests can see.

Why is that ? I run another forum and have over 80 bots visit every day but they are allowed to read closed forums ie what the members can see, ok its not a forumotion forum but its still a  phpbb forum. Just curious to know why ?

Hi,

In a all forums a 'bot', 'meta referencing bot' or 'Google bot' can only see what a guest can see.
A bot can access other links on a site, for example: https://help.forumotion.com/admin
when you access it, you will get told ur don't have permissions to access it.
When a bot access it, it gets a login page, which it of cause cannot see; due to the server side set 'no reference' tag
You can forbid a bot to view a html page as well via a meta tag.
When you see a bot "accessing" a page that only a member can view, they get the login page again.

RadioHead wrote:Hi,

In a all forums a 'bot', 'meta referencing bot' or 'Google bot' can only see what a guest can see.
A bot can access other links on a site, for example: https://help.forumotion.com/admin
when you access it, you will get told ur don't have permissions to access it.
When a bot access it, it gets a login page, which it of cause cannot see; due to the server side set 'no reference' tag
You can forbid a bot to view a html page as well via a meta tag.
When you see a bot "accessing" a page that only a member can view, they get the login page again.

This is correct, but for SEO reasons, I would not block the bots.
Even tho they can not read your forums posts, they can see the title of the post, which is good for both traffic and SEO

If the title gets spidered, anyone interested in seeing the full post, can always join.

We only let the Bots see the open to Guests Group's as if you have say An Admin forum and a mods forum that you need to post privet  info in this will not be leaked out to the world This is why we only let the bots see the open to guests part of the forum.

More of a security thing really you Don't want to have a pass work or account info added to that part of the forum and have the world see it thanks to a bot reading it and putting it on Google for all to see Do you lol

anyway that is how i see why we Hide the closed forums to bots.

Ape