Directory View

[LionHeart55 0]

Is it possible to set Emby to simply show movie files, in the same directory/folder view that the hard drive is organized on? I have searched and not seen this question raised or answered.

My files are carefully organized, and Emby has a lot of trouble with that. Many folders do not show, or show with the wrong images, or mix things together, making it very difficult to browse my media collection.

What I want is to just show the directories, sub-directories, and movie files in each folder.

Is there a configuration that will let me do this?

In advance, thanks.

 

[Abobader 2958]

Hello LionHeart55,

** This is an auto reply **

Please wait for someone from staff support or our members to reply to you.

It's recommended to provide more info, as it explain in this thread:

Thank you.

Emby Team

[seanbuff 846]

25 minutes ago, LionHeart55 said:

Is it possible to set Emby to simply show movie files, in the same directory/folder view that the hard drive is organized on?

Does 'Folder' view give you what you're after? 
 

26 minutes ago, LionHeart55 said:

My files are carefully organized, and Emby has a lot of trouble with that.

If you believe your folder structure follows the supported Emby naming convention (link below), then I would be trying to resolve that first.
https://support.emby.media/support/solutions/articles/44001159102-movie-naming

[Happy2Play 8356]

That is what folder view does, but yes images will be wrong as the folders will inherit usually the first item in the folder.  So you have to apply images to every folder level it you do not want inherited images.

But specific examples would be best.

[rbjtech 4336]

5 hours ago, LionHeart55 said:

Is it possible to set Emby to simply show movie files, in the same directory/folder view that the hard drive is organized on? I have searched and not seen this question raised or answered.

My files are carefully organized, and Emby has a lot of trouble with that. Many folders do not show, or show with the wrong images, or mix things together, making it very difficult to browse my media collection.

What I want is to just show the directories, sub-directories, and movie files in each folder.

Is there a configuration that will let me do this?

In advance, thanks.

 

As above - an example of your structure would be best to advise.  

If you have kept each movie in it's own folder (which you alluded to above) then you can add multiple folders into the library to then correctly identify each movie in the folder below.   If you just try to add the 'root' folder - then emby will struggle as you have not conformed to the naming structure.   A root folder in this example is highlighted in yellow - this should not be added.  The subfolders below it (ie Action) would then contains the individual movie folders with the single media item in them.  This should work as expected.

 

Edited June 7, 2022 by rbjtech

[LionHeart55 0]

Thank you all for your responses, I reviewed the Emby naming convention page and it may be that this is where my problem is. The naming convention says movies should be named like this;

Top Gun - 1986.mp4

Most of my movies are named like this;

1986 - Top Gun 1080p.mp4

The reason for this is that in a name-sort, it ensures that movies with sequels are automatically placed in order, and also because the era of movie making defines the look and feel and storyline so much that sometimes we're in the mood for a 1950s movie, and sometimes for a movie from the 2010s, and it becomes very easily to select from those as a genre unto itself

Here's an example of the directory structure I have using bullets to indicate subfolders. All major series headers start with an underscore, e.g. _Star Wars, _Jason Bourne, _Pinky & the Brain. The file names differ from the folder names, which is also contra-indicated by the Emby naming convention doc. 

• _Star Trek
  • 1 - Movies
    • 1979 - Star Trek - The Motion Picture
      • 1979 - Star Trek - The Motion Picture 1080p BluRay.mkv
    • 1982 - Star Trek II - The Wrath of Khan
      • 1982 - Star Trek II - The Wrath of Khan 720p.mkv
    • 1984 - Star Trek III - The Search for Spock
      • 1984 - Star Trek III - The Search for Spock (REMASTERED) 1080p.mp4
  • 2 - Enterprise
    • Season 1
      • S1E1 - Broken Bow Part 1.mkv
      • S1E2 - Broken Bow Part 2.mkv
      • S1E3 - Fight or Flight.mkv
    • Season 2
  • 3 - Discovery
    • Season 1
    • Season 2
• 1981 - Outland
  • 1981 - Outland 1080p.mp4
• 2014 - Interstellar
  • 2014 - Interstallar 1080p BluRay.mp4
• 2015 - The Martian
  • 2015 - The Martian 720p.mkv

This would be just the Sci Fi top level folder, each genre is a different library in Emby.

That's why I was asking for just a simple folder and video file view mode. When I first installed Emby, that's exactly what it did and everything showed up correctly. I liked it so much that I purchased the lifetime support/upgrade option. But then I made the mistake of trying to tweak the configuration and it's never shown me a simple folder view since. Even when I uninstall, and reinstall, back to a basic configuration, it doesn't give me a simple folder view. 

Thanks, again, for the assistance.

Edited June 8, 2022 by LionHeart55
file name correction

[rbjtech 4336]

Thanks for taking the time to explain.

I think you are missing a trick by not using the items metadata (allowing powerful searches etc, there is even a dedicated 'sort-name' you can add for just this sort of thing..) but lets run with the problem at hand which is why it is not displaying as it was.

As you are mixing TV Shows and Movies - you must use 'Mixed Content' as the library option.

 

Once in the library - what do you see in the 'Folder' View ?

I assume the Library is called lets say 'Science Fiction' - and this points to just c:\Videos\Genre\SciFi (as an example) - under which is the structure you listed above ?

Edited June 8, 2022 by rbjtech

[LionHeart55 0]

I'm not at home so I can't post screen shots (or I would, easier to see from that), but yes, I'm using the 'Mixed Content' option on each genre Library.

What Emby does with the Seasons in each series folder is that it combines the seasons together, even though they're in separate folders. It looks like this;

S01E1

S02E1

S03E1

S01E2

S02E2

S03E2

S01E3

 

I thought the metadata was confusing things, and got closer to a simple folder view by turning it off. I really don't like the media server displaying things in whatever order it wants to do so, that was why I stopped using Plex. We like to browse the selection to choose what we want to watch, and to be honest, while the folder/file pictures are nice, they're not really necessary. We would be happy with just a text-based view that showed the directory/file structure and let us browse for what we wanted, or zero in quickly with a name search if we had no idea what genre or series a title might be in. 

I'm using an old ThinkPad a dedicated media server on my home network, and it has 3 external hard drives connected to it, with various genres on each hard drive. So I think the SciFi folder looks something like this (extra spaces around the back-slash to make it easier to read here in post);

F:\ TV03 \ SciFi \ _Star Trek \ 1 - Movies \ 1979 - Star Trek - The Motion Picture \ Star Trek - The Motion Picture 1080p BluRay.mkv

 

[rbjtech 4336]

I'll be honest and admit that what I believe you are after is going to be tricky - as emby is simply not engineered to be a file browser based on file name.

Your best way forward is at the very least to separate TV and Movies - the problem with mixed types is there is simply no concept of 'Seasons'.

I'm happy to help 'try' to get something resembling what you are after, but I fear it will be a very 'fragile' result - which could easily turn into a nightmare to maintain.

@GrimReaper - Any thoughts to help out the OP ?

[GrimReaper 3330]

27 minutes ago, rbjtech said:

Any thoughts to help out the OP ?

They should switch to Home Videos & photos-type library as metadata is obviously not mandatory, since in Mixed content-type library parser will always try to determine item type and with unsupported naming convention/folder structure like that will likely fail miserably. 

Also, they might hack the config file and in system.xml and options.xml flip

<CollapseVideoFolders>

and 

<CollapseSingleItemFolders>

to 'false' as that'll prevent flattening folder structure. Scan library afterwards. 

Edited June 8, 2022 by GrimReaper

[LionHeart55 0]

1 minute ago, GrimReaper said:

They should switch to Home Videos & photos-type library as metadata is obviously not mandatory, since in Mixed content-type library parser will always try to determine item type. 

Also, they might hack the config file and in system.xml flip

<CollapseVideoFolders>

and 

<CollapseSingleItemFolders>

to 'false' as that'll prevent flatting folder structure. 

Thanks! I'll try that soon and respond here to see if that works!

 

[GrimReaper 3330]

2 hours ago, LionHeart55 said:

Thanks! I'll try that soon and respond here to see if that works!

 

Just (painfully) recreated your folder structure, Folders view in Home videos & photos-type library will give desired results, as if in filesystem browsing. You can even set List view (three-dot menu). 

Edited June 8, 2022 by GrimReaper
Typo

[rbjtech 4336]

11 hours ago, GrimReaper said:

Just (painfully) recreated your folder structure, Folders view in Home videos & photos-type library will give desired results, as if in filesystem browsing. You can even set List view (three-dot menu). 

Thanks Grim - lets hope that does the trick !