Jump to content

FreeNAS plugin


Luke

Recommended Posts

try path substitution

 

just looked up what path substitution is.  That is actually one of the things I already tried. 

 

I can set up a path directly to the file through windows by making the path -

 \\homenas\jails\mediabrowser_1\{PATH}

 

That path will point the client to the absolute path to the video file.  However, it still doesn't work, because the above path looks like this, as an example -

 

\\homenas\jails\mediabrowser_1\usr/local/movies/sample.mkv, 

where the part I bolded is what {PATH} resolves to.

 

The only way to fix this is to force the server to use "\" for it's directory structure instead of "/" when using a windows-based client.  Unless I am missing something else.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

@@josh4trunks, I addressed your question in the freenas forums.  Adding quotes to the path so the argument is treated as a string did not work.  It still does not address the fact that the {PATH} variable uses a forward-slash directory structure instead of a back-slash.  

 

If there is an alternative to using {PATH}, I can get around this.  But that would sort of be avoiding the problem, not solving it.

 

Right now though the bigger issue is with the library not updating properly, that impacts everyone.  This path issue affects anyone who wants to use an external player, or the xbmc plugin.  

Link to comment
Share on other sites

the library realtime monitor will not work on all file systems. that's just reality. if it doesn't work on yours, you can work around it by having the library scan run more frequently.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Vidman

If I understand correctly, both of those screenshots are from the windows mpc-hc software. So when are you actually using MediaBrowser? It looks like you are just trying to use mpc-hc to access the files directly without ever using MediaBrowser?

 

MediaBrowser is typically accessed through the web interface to view the collection and play media, or through the DLNA interface via a media player such as mpc-hc.

Media browser is typically accessed through dedicated clients most of which try to access the file through the file system first before falling back to streaming
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Okay, I see you can set up path substution in the server.

 

that still does not work, since eventually you can only substitute so much of the path, before you run into a forward-slash in the path.

 

I added a path substitution for -

 

/usr/local/movies 

to

\\homenas\jails\mediabrowser_1\usr\local\movies

 

Once it gets to the movie directory, you'll still have a forward-slash in there, such as -

\\homenas\jails\mediabrowser_1\usr\local\movies/borat/borat.mkv

 

I feel like I am beating this issue into the ground, so I will leave it as it is.  If anyone can successfully get direct-path to files working on a windows client, please show us how, as I can't seem to figure it out.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

up until this point path substitution has been primarily used to go from windows to linux. i think it's feature set will need to be expanded.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

up until this point path substitution has been primarily used to go from windows to linux. i think it's feature set will need to be expanded.

Thanks, this would be ideal to get working. I can see a common usage scenario being a user with a Linux/bsd backend and a Windows frontend, especially with the emergence of all the new Linux/bsd backends as of late.

 

Sent from my HTC One_M8 using Tapatalk

Link to comment
Share on other sites

the library realtime monitor will not work on all file systems. that's just reality. if it doesn't work on yours, you can work around it by having the library scan run more frequently.

In all honesty having more frequent periodic library scans is a sufficient solution to this problem.

 

In the end I want mb3 to replace xbmc as my library manager. So even without event based updates, mb3 is still miles better than xbmc at managing metadata. I can just set hourly updates and be done with it.

 

Sent from my HTC One_M8 using Tapatalk

Link to comment
Share on other sites

techiem2

I just installed the plugin on my FreeNAS 9.2.1.7 and ran into a couple issues:

1.  When I expand plugins and click on mediabrowser is says the default location is 192.168.100.2 (this is not any of the IPs on my fileserver).

2.  It doesn't appear to actually be listening - I see the process running but netstat shows nothing listening on 8096.

 

Suggestions?

 

Thanks!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

woodsb02

Yeah I started it, and restarted it. I can see the process running, but it doesn't appear to be listening.

If you open a console in the jail, can you see the mono process running if you type "ps auxww"?

 

Also, do you see any errors in the logs located at /var/db/mediabrowser/logs/server*? The most recent log has the highest number.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

techiem2

How do I open a console to the jail?

I see that that's why the configuration said the IP is 192.168.100.2...that's what it set the jail IP to...

 

This is the first plugin I've installed, so I don't know how the jail system works yet.

I'm guessing the jail configuration should be using an IP subnet that isn't part of my main network?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

woodsb02

Have a read of this user guide (specifically the bit about jails): http://web.freenas.org/images/resources/freenas9.2.1/freenas9.2.1_guide.pdf

 

Essentially a jail is similar to a virtual machine (but with extremely low resource overhead). The jail will have its own IP address, which really must be on the same subnet as the host if you want it to talk on the network.

 

Follow the user guide to open a console in the jail, check your IP address and check for listening services inside the jail.

 

Note: you won't be able to access mediabrowser on the IP address of the FreeNAS box... You will need to access it on the IP address of the jail.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

techiem2

Aha!  Thanks.

The Jail IP was key.  I reconfigured the Jail IP setup to be in a range not handed out by my server and reconfigured the mb jail to a good IP and connected using that and it's alive!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

woodsb02

Aha! Thanks.

The Jail IP was key. I reconfigured the Jail IP setup to be in a range not handed out by my server and reconfigured the mb jail to a good IP and connected using that and it's alive!

Glad to hear it's all working :)
Link to comment
Share on other sites

josh4trunks

I was wondering.. is the FS update support + scanning interval not needed if your download manager informs MB of new files?

Specially how SickRage/CouchPotato send notifications to Kodi/Plex?

 

If this solve this use case, does anyone know how far along SR/CP are in supporting MB? Thanks

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I was wondering.. is the FS update support + scanning interval not needed if your download manager informs MB of new files?

Specially how SickRage/CouchPotato send notifications to Kodi/Plex?

 

If this solve this use case, does anyone know how far along SR/CP are in supporting MB? Thanks

 

if someone can file a request with them, i can give their developers all the info they need. thanks.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 4 weeks later...

did path substitution between a unix/bsd server & windows client get fixed yet, or is it at least on the agenda?  wanna know if I can give this app another shot.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

jjstecchino

A few comment on media browser functionality on freenas....

 

First of all thank you for this port. As a freenas and mediabrowser user I really appreciated having the ability to use mediabrowser server on freenas and be able to turn off the window server that was running mediabrowser. Saving power is always a good thing.

 

Some functionality comment:

 

The button to restart the server is missing. I don't know if this is by design but it was really useful to restart the server from the web gui after an update or a plugin update without having to do it from the freeness plugin interface.

 

Second and perhaps most important, when setting up media folders it is only possible to specify local directories in the mediabrowser jail mapped to the media directories on the freeness server. Clicking on the network item on the list does not bring up any of the existing shares. I do not know why the freebsd version is not able to enumerate available shares as it does on windows. If I understand correctly the preferred way to setup a media folder is to setup as a network share, this path is passed to the clients so that mediabrowser  server does not have to do any streaming or transcoding. With a local path the opposite is true as this path is not accessible from the network. Also when the server fallback to streaming, the client external players which expect a network share to read the media file from fails as posted above by others. The ability of setting up media folder as shares is key to make the freenas media browser plugin functional and usable as many users use external players for their higher quality rendering of movies.

 

 

Other than that everything seems ok. I am going to play a little bit with this and see if I can gain a better insight.

 
  •  
Link to comment
Share on other sites

What you described is the path substitution issue I mentioned just before your post. As great as this plugin is, I unfortunately can't use it until media browser team devises a method of substituting unix paths and makes them valid on Windows clients. To me the solution would just be to have a radio button or toggle that can tell the server it's running on unix so that paths can be substituted properly on Windows clients.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

jjstecchino

What you described is the path substitution issue I mentioned just before your post. As great as this plugin is, I unfortunately can't use it until media browser team devises a method of substituting unix paths and makes them valid on Windows clients. To me the solution would just be to have a radio button or toggle that can tell the server it's running on unix so that paths can be substituted properly on Windows clients.

The problem is that mediabrowser server on FreeBSD seems unable to enumerate or use the existing network share. For this reason path substitution will not work. I am not sure I but it may be a problem with mono as obviously the server works correctly on native .net. Until this is solver mb3 is streaming only on freenas

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The problem is that mediabrowser server on FreeBSD seems unable to enumerate or use the existing network share. For this reason path substitution will not work. I am not sure I but it may be a problem with mono as obviously the server works correctly on native .net. Until this is solver mb3 is streaming only on freenas

 

that's not really a problem. path substitution should work fine once we support what's needed here

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Okay, I see you can set up path substution in the server.

 

that still does not work, since eventually you can only substitute so much of the path, before you run into a forward-slash in the path.

 

I added a path substitution for -

 

/usr/local/movies 

to

\\homenas\jails\mediabrowser_1\usr\local\movies

 

Once it gets to the movie directory, you'll still have a forward-slash in there, such as -

\\homenas\jails\mediabrowser_1\usr\local\movies/borat/borat.mkv

 

I feel like I am beating this issue into the ground, so I will leave it as it is.  If anyone can successfully get direct-path to files working on a windows client, please show us how, as I can't seem to figure it out.

 

try this again with the latest. i think it should be after reviewing path substitution. But instead of testing with the external player, just go to the edit page of an item in the web interface and it will display the new path after substitution

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

woodsb02

try this again with the latest. i think it should be after reviewing path substitution. But instead of testing with the external player, just go to the edit page of an item in the web interface and it will display the new path after substitution

Hi Luke,

Just to clarify, have you made recent changes to the code that fixes this? When was that made?

Remembering that FreeNAS and freebsd only have the latest stable release available (3.0.5445.6).

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...