"Keep up to: N episode(s)" deletes files in non-DVR folders

[dRuEFFECT 7]

I have a library of talk shows I've watched and collected for years which I've sourced externally, and those come in the next day. I also like the option of watching these programs as they're airing from my hdhomerun, but need to be able to start from the beginning when I tune to it so I scheduled a dvr recording for these, and only need the latest episode when recorded from my tuner so I have these set to Keep up to: 1 episode. Previously I had these in separate libraries for "Talk Shows" and "Recordings", each with their own separate directories.

/media/Talk Shows
/dvr/TV

I also have a smart playlist set up for talk shows, where it's set up to unplayed episodes from the Talk Shows directory which aired in the last 3 weeks, and unplayed episodes from the Recordings directory that have aired in the last 1 day. I would go into the playlist and just play all to catch up on my talk shows throughout the day while I'm working from home. The problem here is that I can get duplicate episodes in the playlist because they're in separate libraries, and after watching a downloaded file of an episode the recorded episode is left unwatched and I can end up watching the same episode twice, from each library.

I wanted Emby to be able to see both files as the same episode and only serve up one version in the playlist, so I added the Talk Shows directory to the Recordings library, but as I found in another thread, the "Automatically merge series that are spread across multiple folders" option doesn't actually work if one of those folders exists in another library simultaneously. So I took the Talk Shows folder out of the Talk Shows library to test things out and see if it will merge them. And it did, but with serious consequences.

I wake up today and find a large chunk of storage usage missing and whole seasons of talk shows just gone. I was under the impression that the Keep up to X episodes feature would ONLY apply to the dvr folder where the dvr recordings were being stored and NOT affect any other folders within the library. Apparently this Keep up to feature relies on the target library itself and applies this rule to all episodes of a show within the library regardless of if the episodes were recorded by emby or not. I've lost many years of talk shows that I've been archiving.

And if you say, "why are you archiving talk shows, they're not relevant over time". Well to that I say when I'm old an senile I might find joy in watching old talk shows from hosts I found comforting in my younger days. At least the talk shows that are no longer airing have been unaffected because they were not set to record through dvr, like Conan which is a sin that this man is no longer on television and I'm glad I still have that. But now I did lose all my Daily Show episodes from back when Jon Stewart was host. I had every episode of Colbert's late show, and now it's wiped from existence, just like that. Today is a sad day.

[Luke 37057]

Hi @dRuEFFECTyes it does currently look everywhere but we plan to provide more control over this in future updates. Thanks.