System Internal User permission keeps disappearing

[JesseAR 2]

I have an intermittent problem with the Emby System Internal User Permission that will see the check on the checkbox granting Read/Write permission to the shared music folder go missing from time to time; I can't seem to determine a specific cause for it.  When this happens, any non-administrative user that has been given Read or Read/Write rights to shared music folder will also lose those rights; administrative users, however, never lose their rights to the shared folder even when the Emby Internal User Permission Read/Write checkbox is unchecked. .  As well, sometimes, though not always, when this happens my Windows Media Player playlists which have been modified to be "readable" by Emby also disappear.  By modified I mean that in order for Emby to play my playlists I have to open up a Windows playlist and change all \'s to /'s in the playlist file in order for Emby to be able to properly read said file.  I run Emby on a backup DS1817+ NAS running DSM 7.1.1 with the most recent Update 4 installed and all other packages on the NAS are also up to date, including the Emby package, though this issue has been ongoing since the release of DSM 7 on this NAS and with previous versions of Emby as well.  To be clear, I did not install Emby on this NAS  until after I had already upgraded the NAS to DSM 7 so a DSM 6 to DSM 7 upgrade cause is not present here.  The process that I use is to copy all new music and playlists to the DS1817+ from a DS1821+ NAS that is used by all of our users to play music using Windows Media Player thus ensuring that both music folders are synced though I should be clear that this issue presents itself even if there has been no music or playlists copied over an extended period of time.  The only thing that is different between the 2 music folders is the addition of modified copies of the wpl (windows playlist) files containing the \ / modification described above, with the modified playlists having the addition of a - in front of the name of the modifed file that Emby is able to read.  For example, the Playlists folder contains one file titled - Ludovico Einaudi.wpl and one file titled Ludovico Einaudi.wpl.

As stated, this issue doesn't crop up very often and I have a backup folder of my modified playlists that I can easily copy over to the Playlists folder whenever they disappear, so getting back up and running has not been a major burden.  Interesting enough the unmodified Windows Playlists that also reside in the Playlists folder never disappear nor does any of the music.  I am open to any suggestions that anyone might have in trying to resolve this vexing issue as it would be nice to just "know" that Emby will operate as it should when it is used and I don't have to provide permissions or copy over playlists at inoppertune times like when friends visit.

Regards.

[Luke 37119]

Quote

 that will see the check on the checkbox granting Read/Write permission to the shared music folder go missing from time to time; I can't seem to determine a specific cause for it.

Hi @JesseAR where exactly are you referring to? Do you mean permissions in DSM?

[JesseAR 2]

Hi Luke,

Yes, the permissions in DSM for my music folder keep disappearing; I provide the system internal user EMBY read/write permissions and, from time to time, they just disappear and when this happens the Emby app does not work correctly and I can't play my music.  Sometimes the pointers to the music show up within Emby but clicking on them has no effect and sometimes none of the music in my music folders show up.  I have not been able to see a pattern in terms of my doing anything that would cause this.  Emby works great for a few weeks and then I am unable to play any music from artists, playlists, etc., when using Emby.  When this happens, I have to reset the DSM rights for the EMBY system internal user and things work again.  As well, and this happens much less often, the modified windows playlists that I need to create so that Emby can "read" the playlist and play the music will disappear from the Playlists folder contained within the Music folder where all my music is stored.  I have a backup of all my playlists so when this happens I copy the playlists over and all is well again.  Very rarely, both issues happen simultaneously and I have to reset EMBY permisions and copy the modified playlists to the playlist folder to get things to work again.  

While I know how to fix the issues I was wondering if there is anything that I am doing wrong or not doing and should be doing as I am the only one in the family that has both administrative rights to the NAS and knows how to fix the issue.  It would be nice to just have things work.

Thank you in advance, Luke, for any guidance you may provide.

Regards,

Jesse

[Luke 37119]

Hi, I've never heard of this. Is it possible you have something deleting and then recreating the music folder? 

[JesseAR 2]

The only thing that I do with this music folder is a shared folder sync from another NAS where I keep the master copy of my music and playlists.  So, while it is true that if I added or deleted a music folder from the master NAS then the NAS where I have Emby running on would also see that folder added or deleted. I have never had issues with this process working as it should.  As stated from time to time I lose the modified Windows playlist wpl files that allow Emby to play my playlists.  This only happens to these modified files; the original Windows wpl files that are also stored in the playlist folder, which gets updated via rsync from time to time, are never touched.  I don't believe that folder syncing would lead to Emby losing read/write privileges to the music folder and forcing me to re-enable these rights to the Emby internal user account, but perhaps there is something I don't understant? As well, this weird behavior happens at odd times when I have not touched any of my music files, folder, or playlists in days or even weeks.

Like you, I have found this behavior puzzling as I can't seem to link together anything that would be causing this.  Thanks for working this through with me.  Regards.

[Luke 37119]

@JesseARare you still running into this?

@cayarsdo you have any thoughts on this?

[JesseAR 2]

I have had it happen once since we started this thread.  This is an improvement over the weekly hiccups that were occuring before.  I wish I had more ideas to share but perhaps it is tied to DSM; I have 7.1 running with the latest updates and it has stablized other apps.  Perhaps 7.2 will fix this issue we are facing once it becomes available.  My gut tells me it is a combination of the DSM and Emby but I don't have proof of this that I can point to.  Just 40+ years of having spent time in the IT field in both the hardware and software environments.  Thanks for checking back.  It is much appreciated.

[Carlo 4330]

Check your DSM file logs to see what program is changing the permissions on you.
It could very well be your file syncing program that is changing this.

Besides the above, you should be able to set "emby" as the file owner as well as "emby" as the group owner.
Set the permissions at the root of the media folder as well as set it up to casqued to all sub directories.  Setup the permissions to be the defaults written and then check your syncing program to make it not copy any type of ownership/permission info as it well be inherited from the root of your media.

Unless you have a reason don't allow windows users to modify directories or files in your media section.  Give them only read access.

[JesseAR 2]

Understood.  Will apply the settings you are recommending.  Regards.