My SMF is getting over-traffic !!!

[GleamPlay.com]

I just started using SMF for about 2 months and i don't know why my forum reaches 5GB traffic very fast.

I use a free host, the host offers 5GB traffic per month and they will be reset after 1 month.

My SMF don't really have much members, maybe about 2-7 members and 10 posts per day, but the traffic is getting very high.

Anything I can do to reduce the traffic? Please help

My SMF link: gleam.co.nf

[kat]

You need to ask your host what this traffic is, exactly.

It could just be bots/spiders and things, like that.

But, until we know what it is, we can't make any suggestions, I'm afraid.

[Illori]

if the traffic is due to search engines it is possible to identify some of them directly through smf.

admin -> core features enable search engine tracking and save the page, then go to search engines in the admin panel then settings make sure the tracking level is at some value higher then disabled and save the page

once the search engines crawl your forum you can view them on the stats page on search engines.

if you find one crawling too much you can try to limit the spider in robots.txt.

if the hits are real people/guests nothing you can do to stop those really.

[GleamPlay.com]

admin -> core features enable search engine tracking and save the page, then go to search engines in the admin panel then settings make sure the tracking level is at some value higher then disabled and save the page

once the search engines crawl your forum you can view them on the stats page on search engines.

I have disabled the search engine and on the stats page, there are no bots, but my traffic is still getting high its about 200-400MB per day and 5GB is my limit

Also in my SMF, there are many guest browsing but i don't know why. There are like 9 guest and 1 user everytime I see. Is there any way to remove those unwanted guest? Because I believe they are not real people

[Storman™]

Seems a bit high to me, would have though at least half that.

Try something like CrawlTrack and monitor your traffic for a while.

It will give you an indication of whats going on 

[GleamPlay.com]

1) I installed CrawlTrack to my website, what should I do to get it working because it keep saying 0 visitor and 0 for anything, but there are some visitors. Do I need to put some code in my pages or?

2) Also, is there any ways to completely block all bots and guests?

3) I found a feature to disable all guest in the SMF, but it's saying "You don't have permission, please register to..." Is there any way to edit that page, or make it sound more "friendly" like "Sigh up for free!"?

Thanks for spending your time to help me

[Storman™]

I installed CrawlTrack to my website, what should I do to get it working because it keep saying 0 visitor and 0 for anything, but there are some visitors. Do I need to put some code in my pages or?

Sounds like its not completely installed, have you installed the tags ? Might be best to read the documentation and raise any queries on the CrawlTrack forum:

http://www.crawltrack.net/documentation.php

http://www.crawltrack.net/doccms.php

[GleamPlay.com]

Thank you very much

now I see 3 google bot visit in 1 hour, how to disable them?

[Tony Reid]

How do you know that its not someone hot linking your site? Maybe you need to take a look at your sites logs.

I seriously doubt google is causing that drain. Sign up to googles webmaster tools, and you can see the crawl stats in there - including how much they are downloading from your site.

https://www.google.com/webmasters/

[GleamPlay.com]

I checked the Dashboard and I found there are 3 crawlers (Baidu, Google and Yandex) with 34 visits and 2 page view.
and real visitors are 9 visitors, 98 page views.

1) Is it maybe my free web host provide too less space or?

2) Also, is there any ways to completely block all bots and guests?

3) I found a feature to disable all guest in the SMF, but it's saying "You don't have permission, please register to..." Is there any way to edit that page, or make it sound more "friendly" like "Sign up for free!"?

[Arantor]

1. Free web hosts are notorious for being limited. It's quite simple: you're a burden to them. They're paying money to keep the server running and you're not paying them for it. Consequently they're really not going to take too kindly to busy sites.

2. You can disable guests from being on the site (which will keep guests off too) as you seem to have found.

3. It's not exactly meant to be friendly. While you could edit it, the reality is that it'll still put people off and depending on your forum's purpose, keeping out visitors (and search engines) might just kill it entirely...

[GleamPlay.com]

Thanks Arantor

Will disable guest/bot reduce the traffic?

And is there a way to change the words in the guest login section?

My SMF is using Simple Portal, is there a way to include the Simple Portal Blocks in that page too?

[Arantor]

Disabling guests and bots may or may not reduce the traffic significantly.

Changing the words in the guest login section is a code change.

I have no idea whether you can include SP blocks in it. That said, if you declare the blocks as showing up on action=login you should be able to do that (see the SP site for further information if needed)

[GleamPlay.com]

Thanks

Also, is 9 visitors, 98 page views normal? 1 person view 10 pages?
and will that cause many traffic?

How to change code in guest login section?

[Arantor]

That's unusual... and I'm not sure that keeping guests out will fix it! I don't want to give you the code because I'm pretty sure it won't actually solve your problem.

The guest login page is not 'bandwidth free', you know, it still requires almost as much work and bandwidth as a regular page to generate. Meaning that if you're limited by bandwidth you're still going to be limited pretty quickly.

Seems to me the problem is that you're using a really bad host.

[GleamPlay.com]

umm

I am actually using co.nf now and I tried 000webhost.com and neq3.com before.
But 000webhost and neq3 got a white screen of death in Installing Mod page.

Do you have any good free host suggestions? or I must pay in order to get a good host?

000webhost and neq3 got 50GB traffic but white screen of death

[Arantor]

You won't get something good for nothing. Remember: when you're using a free host, you're actually costing them money.

You get what you pay for.

[GleamPlay.com]

so no free hosting is good?
why do they offer free hosting if I am only a burden to them

Any "Okay" web hosting?

[GleamPlay.com]

OMG!!! its 4.4/5GB now and I checked Dashboard, there is 5visitor and 101 page view...

Should I set the forum to maintainance mode?

[GleamPlay.com]

so what should I do?