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Choose to save individual metadata & artwork to media folders


dominicM

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dominicM

Right now there is only an option to "Save artwork and metadata into media folders". This is quite restrictive as you either get a whole bunch af files with your movies or nothing at all. You also do not get performance benefits of an SSD with this option selected or if it's not selected you do not get metadata (nfo) files for Kodi or folder.jpg for windows explorer.

 

I would like the option to choose what metadata and artwork to save where and even to both system and media folders at the same time. In my case I would save .nfo metadata file and folder.jpg poster to media folders for Kodi and Windows explorer respectively as well as all metadata and artwork to the system drive for performance and power saving reasons (single ssd access vs multiple hdds spinning up).

Edited by dominicM
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Koleckai Silvestri

If you leave your cache on the SSD, then you would get the benefits of having things in both locations. The metadata is with the media for multiple uses and what I think is better organization. The cache makes sure the most frequently accessed items are accessed as quickly as possible to speed up client apps.

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dominicM

What do you mean by cache exactly? I wouldn't consider MB3 system storage location cache since it is the only location (unless the options to save to media folders is selected). Another issue is the "messiness" created by having all those files in media directories. It doesn't make sense to have files that are not used almost universally like folder.jpg. Things like clearart are only used for certain applications so it has no purpose in the media folder. It's also true for .nfo files but Kodi and MB3 doesn't talk directly so that's the only solution for now.

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The purpose of storing them in the media folders is not having to re-download them for every time you re-install a server or access the same items with another server.  This speeds up your scans and relieves an unnecessary load on the free providers we use.

 

And Koleckai is correct - the server maintains a cache and having these items stored in the media folder vs. in the system location will not cause any perceptible performance impact.  Except as I noted above where it will perform much better if you re-install or install a new server.  That is why our suggestion is to store them in the folders with the media.

 

There is an option to store them as hidden files.

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dominicM

The purpose of storing them in the media folders is not having to re-download them for every time you re-install a server or access the same items with another server.  This speeds up your scans and relieves an unnecessary load on the free providers we use.

 

And Koleckai is correct - the server maintains a cache and having these items stored in the media folder vs. in the system location will not cause any perceptible performance impact.  Except as I noted above where it will perform much better if you re-install or install a new server.  That is why our suggestion is to store them in the folders with the media.

 

There is an option to store them as hidden files.

 

 

 

That does make some sense though couldn't one just select the option to move the metadata files to media folders when they are switching their metadata scraper / manager / theater software? There is no advantage to keeping all metadata with the media all the time thought I do see the benefit to have an option to move metadata to media folders for the purpose of migration. Also how often does one change their home theater application and how long it takes to re-downlod metadata. Not often and even with massive collections scraping will be done within a day.

 

On the other hand there are negatives to this method of metadata management. Storing metadata with media folders will result in a massive performance decrease when the hard drive is asleep, since it takes several seconds to wake up. In my case since I am using virtual volume this will be multiplied by up to the number of drives present (7 for now) since they wake up one by one until the file is found. There are also unnecessary and significant wear, noise and power issues associated.

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Like I said before, the items are cached on the server.  We don't read them out of the media folders for normal access.

 

Having more control over exactly what is saved is not a bad idea and may happen at some point.  I'm simply pointing out that some of your fears about saving in the media folders are not a problem.  There could be other valid reasons however.

 

You also are only looking at this from your perspective.  If most of our users did not store this information with their media then we would put a HUGE and unnecessary strain on providers like tmdb and tvdb.  We would like to not do that to them if possible.

 

Also, you don't always know when a hard drive is going to crash and you need to re-install something.

 

Finally, changing the option of saving or not saving to the media folders does not go through and automatically migrate everything from one location to the other. It will only affect items that are saved after the option is changed.

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dominicM

I didn't realize all metadata gets cached and if this happens reliably and does not wake the hard drives periodically then it solved that problem though it does duplicate artwork unnecessarily if you don't need to store artwork in media folders for other reasons.

 

Also while MB3 might cache these files does Kodi cache just as reliably or will it wake my drives up?

 

Re-downloading should of course be the last resort but a better solution would be to provide good exporting capabilities to users as opposed to making users choose all or nothing when it comes to storage location.

 

Regarding hard drive crashes... I would like to say backups prevent this but I haven't gotten around to setting that up yet so... :)

 

There should also be an option to sync previously downloaded metadata either to or from media folders if media provider bandwidth is to be spared.

 

 

I certainly hope individual artwork and metadata options are added as to me this lack makes MB3 useful for nothing else other than remote streamer app and I haven't needed that yet. Currently I rely on Couchpotato for movies and Sonarr for TV to download my metadata as it allows to select exactly what metadata/artwork to download and what to name it. The only issue with CP is that you cannot run it on previously downloaded items. The way I see it MB3 should excel at providing metadata to Kodi and similar but in my case it can't do that without it saving a bunch of otherwise useless files to my media folders. Hidden files are unfortunetely not an option since I enabled hidden files for many mostly unrelated reasons.

Edited by dominicM
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  • 1 year later...
Alceste

I have a question in this respect: What does Emby do with artwork I pulled from the internet with 3rd party software such as Tiny Media manager? I assume it stumpbles upon them via the nfo file. But what happens next? does it transfer that into the cache and serves it to clients from there or do clients get it from folder where it was originally saved to (i.e. the folder where you store the movie for example)?

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Alceste

Thanks,

 

not entirely though. does it derve these images to clients directly from where those are stored (i.e. in my case from the HDDs) or from the system folder (i.e. in my case from the SSD)?

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directly from where they are stored although if any image processing is required then that output will be cached for future use within the server's cache folder.

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  • 1 year later...
HappyPig0

Hi, trying out Emby before signing up to Premiere, like it a lot. One thing I am not so keen on is artwork filling up my media folders, e.g my movies folder. Looking back through this thread, are we now able to save the artwork in a specifically created folder which I could call Artwork? Thank you. Chris

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Hi, trying out Emby before signing up to Premiere, like it a lot. One thing I am not so keen on is artwork filling up my media folders, e.g my movies folder. Looking back through this thread, are we now able to save the artwork in a specifically created folder which I could call Artwork? Thank you. Chris

 

Hi, welcome @@HappyPig0. Saving metadata in media folders is actually off by default. The default location is underneath the server's program data folder, but you can configure to store it elsewhere. Please let us know if this helps. Thanks !

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HappyPig0

Hi, welcome @@HappyPig0. Saving metadata in media folders is actually off by default. The default location is underneath the server's program data folder, but you can configure to store it elsewhere. Please let us know if this helps. Thanks !

 

Hi Luke and thank you, wow that was a quick response, brilliant. Getting late here so I will have a go again tomorrow with your advice. Thanks again. PS... I'm one of those new Plex leavers! Really very impressed with Emby. 

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Happy2Play

Hi, trying out Emby before signing up to Premiere, like it a lot. One thing I am not so keen on is artwork filling up my media folders, e.g my movies folder. Looking back through this thread, are we now able to save the artwork in a specifically created folder which I could call Artwork? Thank you. Chris

 

Yes you can designate a new location for the "metadata" folder.  So if you point this path to Artwork you still would get several subfolders for all the metadata being stored there.  All the media artwork is actually stored in \metadata\library\xx\xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx (itemid folders).

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HappyPig0

Thank you @@Happy2Play. One other general thing if I may.... I am unable to access the Emby website on Safari... having to use Chrome. Media Server access is fine though. Thought it worth sharing, sorry, off topic and all!

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HappyPig0

@@Luke @@Happy2Play - all set up how I wanted it. Thank you again. Had fun getting the remote set up, no thanks to my router and the headache port forwarding it presented, but got there. Opted for the annual Premiere subscription rather than lifetime... a solid investment in my eyes that. Cheers again and good luck with the Safari website loading issue. Seems to be mainly isolated to the homepage if that's any help.

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Thanks for the feedback. I have tested mac safari and am not seeing any problems, but i'll keep an eye on it. Thanks.

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  • 5 months later...

The latest release of Emby Server allows you to save individual artwork and metadata to media folders.

 

Enjoy.

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dominicM

The latest release of Emby Server allows you to save individual artwork and metadata to media folders.

 

Enjoy.

I am not seeing any new options, can you elaborate what/where changed?

 

The only difference I see is that emby started saving banner and poster along with the movies which absolutely not what I want nor did I make any changes for this to start happening.

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