mitstoshi wrote in 34 above:
"I am on HS 10.13.6 and wonder if I should upgrade to Mojave now. My questions are: (1) Any way to keep HFS+? If not, can you elaborate on the suggestion by Fisherman?"
Because of the problems of software update not working properly with HFS+ and Mojave, I "compromised" and created an APFS partition for my OS/apps, with HFS+ partitions for my data storage.
I broke my internal drive down like this:
Boot - APFS (has OS, apps, and a stripped-down home folder)
Main - HFS+ (regular data and personal stuff)
Media - HFS+ (photos, a few other things)
Music - HFS+ self-explanatory
This seems to be working well enough for me.
I realize that for some folks, more than a single drive icon becomes confusing.
I don't mind having them at all.