Symlinks not followed

[Spotta 6]

Hi

I have started experimenting with Filebot to auto create symlinks on my media in the correct format for Emby while leaving the original files where they are, I am just manually running the script on some test files at the moment while I fine tune it,

The symlinks get created, Emby is populating the extra data, but the files are not playable on Theater, web client or iOS app. I'm on Win2016 and would prefer to use Hardlinks but they are not supported on Drivepool.

I thought symlinks were supported by Emby, am I missing something here?

[Luke 37065]

They are, but we are not doing anything to handle them. They are handled transparently by the file system libraries that we use. So while they should work, the more complicated you make things, the more trouble you can expect.

[Spotta 6]

Edit. The symlinks work perfectly in Windows. 

Edited October 26, 2017 by Spotta

[Spotta 6]

I can access the shared TV Shows folder on the server using my laptop and playing the symlink plays the original file fine.

Even if I access the TV Show share with my MBP it plays the original file perfectly, it is only Emby that has an issue.

 

One file pointing to another one is not exactly what I would call complicated, with so many people using drive pooling software for their collections I would have though that being able to handle symlinks would be a necessity these days. 

[Spotta 6]

You may not be doing anything to handle them, but it looks like you are doing something to break them.

[Luke 37065]

You may not be doing anything to handle them, but it looks like you are doing something to break them.

 

I don't believe that is true, sorry.

[Spotta 6]

Upgraded to 3.2.34.0

tried to play a symlink that works fine on a networked PC and Mac

the attached logs were generated. 

 

ffmpeg-transcode-2bbaaee0-8c0e-4410-b606-29e8a1449f3e.txt

ffmpeg-transcode-8a11c49c-8f45-4514-99cd-ee4659359474.txt

ffmpeg-transcode-83e344df-1211-4188-895b-191f12922551.txt

ffmpeg-transcode-18043b6f-9fac-4a6b-86d3-c552c9eee5ac.txt

ffmpeg-transcode-ab740214-5a02-4c83-9578-cf058e2ac23e.txt

ffmpeg-transcode-afa4a926-3a65-4fae-a152-bc6376671055.txt

ffmpeg-transcode-b87eb69e-7d46-4a56-9ca6-fb9b352eda67.txt

ffmpeg-transcode-bb5dfe0a-f779-4c27-b037-b50314cc738d.txt

ffmpeg-transcode-ca8275f0-20d5-4f58-a0b8-6d1bcc629cc6.txt

server-63644650318.txt

[Luke 37065]

The problem appears to be ffmpeg not following the symlink, as we are just passing it the original path.

 

So now here is the problem. We often pass the media path directly to external applications such as ffmpeg, or directly into an audio or video player, or directly into an image processing library.

 

So now by using symlink you are dependant on all of those things supporting them as well.

 

The more you simplify, the more everything will just work.

[Spotta 6]

yep. I do have a valid reason for requiring them though, I'll try and figure out a workaround for my workaround.