Best migration strategy?

[Kirk137 1]

Hi all,

 

Due to some changes in my environment, I want to migrate my Emby server from a VMWare VM running CentOS 7 on to a physical server running the same.

 

I tried to migrate by using CloneZilla to clone the entire server, but apparently there are some complications due to the LVM configuration on the VM.  Once cloned to the real hardware, the server wouldn't boot.

 

So, that leaves me with the option to do a fresh OS install and rebuild.  The problem is my Emby installation is configured to store metadata in the Emby program folder not in the media library itself.  My Emby server only has read-only access to the media library due to the way my storage is setup, so allowing it to write the metadata there was never really an option.

 

There are numerous shows and movies that I've adjusted the identity on, uploaded custom covers for more rare items, etc.  I'd rather not redo all that work if I don't have to.

 

It seems to me there are 2 possible strategies:

1) Rsync some paths from the /ProgramData folder, as described here: https://github.com/MediaBrowser/Wiki/wiki/Backup

 

 

Backup Files

Shutdown the old server instance and backup the following files and directories:

• /ProgramData/config
• /ProgramData/plugins
• /ProgramData/data/collections
• /ProgramData/data/playlists
• /ProgramData/data/displaypreferences.db/ProgramData/data/userdata_v2.db (if present)
• /ProgramData/data/users.db

Additionally, backup the library database file, but put it into a separate place from the others. This file will not be copied into your new Emby Server installation, but we will migrate your user data, such as watched data, favorites, etc. /ProgramData/data/library.db This will backup saved configurations, installed plugins, collections you've created, playlists, display preferences and the user database.

Note: Unless you use a custom Metadata path you will want to backup your /ProgramData/metadata folder to preserve your People images. The only two folder in metadata you don't need are library and views.

 

2) It was suggested to me that I could do this with the Emby Backup plugin, but I don't see anything specific in that plugin that says it's backing up my metadata.

 

Has anyone done either of these with success?

 

I started to try to do the manual rsync but ran into problems, I think my problems are stemming from the fact that my current Emby server is out of date, but when I run "yum update" it says there are no updates available.

 

[Kirk137 1]

After working on this tonight, I was able to do it with the rsync method following this guide:  https://github.com/MediaBrowser/Wiki/wiki/Backup

 

It turns out that the first time around, I installed Emby from a package rather than from the repository, so the versions were different.  I was able to install tonight using the repository and completed my migration!

[Luke 37176]

Glad you figured it out. Thanks for the info !

[kaizo 0]

Hello there embyans

 

Due to some changes in my environment, I want to migrate my Emby server...

 

The problem is my Emby installation is configured to store metadata in the Emby program folder not in the media library itself.  My Emby server only has read-only access to the media library due to the way my storage is setup, so allowing it to write the metadata there was never really an option.

 

There are numerous shows and movies that I've adjusted the identity on, uploaded custom covers for more rare items, etc.  I'd rather not redo all that work if I don't have to.

 

2) It was suggested to me that I could do this with the Emby Backup plugin, but I don't see anything specific in that plugin that says it's backing up my metadata.

 

Im in the exact same position atm (migrating from OSX-install to a Linux-install), with the one exception that my mediapaths have changed slightly.

I put quite a lot of time editing/identifying some rare movies and shows by hand, and i don't want to do all of this again! Nor do i want to re-index my whole library after the migration as suggested here https://github.com/MediaBrowser/Wiki/wiki/Backup#install-emby-server-on-the-new-machine (unnecessary io-stress).

 

How can we migrate all library-data/indexed-metadata (except the mediafiles of course) without the stress of re-indexing and re-editing every movie/show again and again?

 

I'snt there a way of just copy the library database and correct the paths by hand (Sqlite database editor e.g.)?

 

I just want a "simple" way to migrate my "whole" emby-data/installation. Can we please have a guide/howto/plugin on this?

I would really appreciate any attention/support on this topic.

 

Thanks in advance

kaizo

Edited October 19, 2018 by kaizo

[Luke 37176]

That wiki article outlines our supported backup methods. If you want to be able to just pick up and move it, newer server installations will handle that better than others. A new server installation of 3.6+ can be picked up and moved as much as you like.