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I switched from Emby Server docker to the portable Windows emby server. To migrate, I copied everything under the full backup folder that the backup plugin created and restored the content with the backup plugin again on the new server. In the backup, I'd included metadata of library and people, also I save metadata of tv shows and movies libraries to nfo files, not for the home videos & photos library though. When I restored and scanned the libraries, I lost my home videos and photos favorites, although it kept the movies and shows favorites. Why is that and what could I have done to keep the favorites of the home videos and photos library ?

Sometime soonish I'll be upgrading my desktop PC, at which point I'll make the current one my new and faster/upgraded media server. My question is in backing up/restoring Emby on Debian on a new box. With Plex, I ran it in a docker container (along with all my *arr apps) and I could simply stop all the images, then copy over my directory that I had mounted as an external path for all my configs for each docker app. Then when I moved to a new machine, I just reinstalled, and copied it all back over: Plex would maintain its DB and wouldn't have to spend days regenerating every thumbnail. Is there a similar simple way on Debian to do the same? I use the default paths, so it's using /var/lib/emby and under that it stores everything, like the gigs of thumbnails images generated. Can I just copy that folder to my NAS (after stopping Emby to make sure it's not still writing), and then on a new machine, after I go through the initial install process, shut it down, then copy that folder back over? Or are there other folders that Emby relies on for configuration info I'll need to back up too? Like do I also have to copy over /opt/emby-server? Thanks!

Using the guide here I backed up the files it said which included many from /var/lib/emby on my system. I wiped and reinstalled the os and followed the guide on restoring. When it came to setting up emby through the web interface it just paused and did nothing. So I uninstalled emby using my package manager and noticed it left /var/lib/emby untouched although it originally created it itself so I manually deleted it. When I installed the package again it did not create /var/lib/emby and the web interface appears to not be running. It's not creating a service that I can start or restart but systemctl has "emby-server@" and "emby-server@.service". When I enable through systemctl it seems to have no effect. I tried installing emby on another device and copying /var/lib/emby across but again it made no difference. How can I get emby working again? At this point restoring userdata is not a concern but I would like to get emby working without reinstalling the os again. The hardware is a raspberry pi 4b with 4gbs of ram and the os is the latest version of raspbian.

I had a run of bad luck recently and had my primary SSD die on me (thrice) each time requiring me to rebuild my server from scratch and each time I had to redo all my custom images and all my custom metadata (probably talking less than a couple dozen files but I digress). So out of frustration of not having a really good backup tool for Plex available (that I could find anyway) I decided to give Emby a shot as I saw it had a backup and restore plugin. "GREAT", I thought, "Maybe someone realized I don't want to redo the same work over and over whenever my box goes down". So I downloaded Emby, setup some media files (external drive), made some customization, setup the plugin, ran the backup and went to another computer to run the restore. What do I find when I do the restoration? well that some of my media (stuff that I didn't customize) is now lacking metadata (images and text) AND that none of my customizations are part of the backup apparently UGH!!! Can someone please explain to me why this is? cause I really want to know. There doesn't appear to be any settings to change in the menu to ensure metadata and custom images are preserved so a novice (aka me) would assume this would just be part of the default setting. Is this a bug or a "Feature" cause if it's a "Feature" I'm going to rip my hair out! I just cannot understand why this would be, Is this a technical limitation? Can we really not have Emby backup store the metadata and image files in a backup file as part of the backup process? I just don't see why the thing I care the most about backing up (i.e. my manual work that I don't want to repeat) isn't being backed up by the backup tool. I've found mention here and there (after yet more googling) about having to do a separate backup of the metadata directory (nothing step by step though) but again WHY!?!? Why do I have to do this instead of the tool? Isn't that what the tool is for? Making things easier to restore? Sigh...Sorry, I don't mean to labor the point but if someone can please explain what the reason is that this isn't a function of the plugin I would really like to understand. It's more frustrating not understanding what the limitation is (and what the workaround is step by step) than it is to have to redo the work. If someone could just say "It can't do that and here is the technical reason why" or better yet "It can't do it YET but it will be able to in XX months" that would be fantastic because at least I'd finally know. TLDR; backup and restore plugin doesn't restore customized images and metadata n00b doesn't understand why.