Issues with Metadata update (especially file names)

[asquare3376 5]

Hello and thank you for taking out the time to read my post. Here's what I am facing and would love not to go through the exercise of updating file names manually everytime I switch/migrate servers.

1. My emby installation was running on Synology DS1821+ running DSM 7.2.1

2. Got Synology expansion unit and decided to change RAID types for my existing HDD storage setup

3. Took a backup of my emby server using the 'Backup & Restore' plugin before I went for the storage upgrade

4. Backed up all my content to local machine. All my metadata folders had the nfo files and all artworks.

5. Storage expanded, RAID updated, emby installed and settings restored using the same 'Backup & Restore' plugin

6. Files copied to the Synology NAS, updated Library path to take content from newly created directories

7. Waited quite a while until all files were scanned by emby, only to find out later that the artwork remained as-is, the way I wanted them to be, but the File names have changed for a lot of them forcing me to manually edit their metadata which is time consuming. Why didn't emby read this info from the nfo files I had in each of the movie folders?

 If you look at the attachment, I now have 3 Evil Dead movies, all from 2013. It should be 1 Evil Dead from 1981 and 2 from 2013 (one being Extended version, other being Theatrical). 

Anothe nuisance is 'The Exorcism Of Emily Rose' which is now ''The Exorcism of Emily Rose'' (small letter 'O')

[asquare3376 5]

I believe I figured out why this happened.

Unchecking this box helped me achieve what I was looking for i.e. images and nfo metadata remain unchanged

[Luke 37095]

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7. Waited quite a while until all files were scanned by emby, only to find out later that the artwork remained as-is, the way I wanted them to be, but the File names have changed for a lot of them forcing me to manually edit their metadata which is time consuming. Why didn't emby read this info from the nfo files I had in each of the movie folders?

 I

Hi, Emby does use the information in your nfo files, but it will also supplement that with whatever internet metadata you have enabled. Then the end result will be written back to the nfo file if you have nfo saving enabled.

Just FYI, disabling nfo saving when you have an existing nfo is going to create one problem for you: If you use the metadata editor, the server won't be able to write your changes back to the nfo, which means your changes will likely be lost later at some point when the nfo gets reread.

Maybe we're guilty of offering too many options and allowing users to make their own mess, but if you have nfo reading enabled then I would suggest enabling saving as well.

[asquare3376 5]

2 hours ago, Luke said:

Maybe we're guilty of offering too many options and allowing users to make their own mess

That's why I chose emby & not Plex 

Several things on my mind now:

1. When you already have the old nfo, emby should not try to update the metadata, unless the user explicitly ask for the update to happen (can we have a check box to have this functionality added?) As you've seen in my screenshot how this metadata update messed up the identity of the Evil Dead movies (my old nfo had all the right info, the update got it all wrong)

2. At the time of adding the library, I chose to uncheck the nfo metadata saver and saved hundreds of minutes of effort going back & forth, trying to do the right 'identification' from imdb or moviedb etc. Say now that I have everything looking right in place, enabling the nfo metadata saver seems to be the right thing to do as I might update the metadata of some of my content and don't want to lose it in case if I do another mega refresh in future. Is enabling the save going to hurt the existing metadata? probably not...

3. Regardless of what you have as far as the nfo read/write goes, I have noticed that when you have 2 or more versions of the same named movie viz. theatrical, alternate, director's cut, extended etc., watching one affects them all even if they are in totally different folders/libraries. Any thoughts?

 

Regards,

Amit

[Luke 37095]

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1. When you already have the old nfo, emby should not try to update the metadata, unless the user explicitly ask for the update to happen (can we have a check box to have this functionality added?) As you've seen in my screenshot how this metadata update messed up the identity of the Evil Dead movies (my old nfo had all the right info, the update got it all wrong)

Unless you refresh metadata, the server will not change info coming from the nfo file. But it will on a metadata refresh outside of locked fields.

[Luke 37095]

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3. Regardless of what you have as far as the nfo read/write goes, I have noticed that when you have 2 or more versions of the same named movie viz. theatrical, alternate, director's cut, extended etc., watching one affects them all even if they are in totally different folders/libraries. Any thoughts?

Resume points are based on provider ids, not individual files. There's pros and cons to this, and lots of existing discussions about it. @Happy2Playmight know some.

[asquare3376 5]

On 2/29/2024 at 7:07 PM, Luke said:

Unless you refresh metadata, the server will not change info coming from the nfo file. But it will on a metadata refresh outside of locked fields.

I simply added 'my media library path' under libraries folders to scan. Movies folder had sub-folders, one each for every movie with their asociated nfo files in it. emby should have just read it and left it untouched but it updated all of it and incorrectly identified many titles. Shocked by this revelation, I had to uncheck the nfo metadata saver.

I still think you should add an option if user explicitly wants their old nfo to be updated or nbot while importing a library. By default, it should be a "No"

Movies

/volume2/Movies/Movies

[Luke 37095]

19 hours ago, asquare3376 said:

I simply added 'my media library path' under libraries folders to scan. Movies folder had sub-folders, one each for every movie with their asociated nfo files in it. emby should have just read it and left it untouched but it updated all of it and incorrectly identified many titles. Shocked by this revelation, I had to uncheck the nfo metadata saver.

I still think you should add an option if user explicitly wants their old nfo to be updated or nbot while importing a library. By default, it should be a "No"

Movies

/volume2/Movies/Movies

Hi there, let's look at a specific example:

How to Report a Problem

Thanks.

[asquare3376 5]

Will do, thanks