Orphaned Files

[Carlo 4330]

On a new LG Phone I set my dad up with some downloaded files (through Emby) to an external SD Card.

I've since had to reformat the SD Card.

 

I had assumed Emby would see the files don't exist on the local SD card anymore and either remove them or allow me to remove them but they show up but of course can't play.  I have no "delete" button/link so I'm stuck trying to figure out out to remove these orphaned files of his Emby client so I can start again.

 

I uninstalled/re-installed Emby client but that didn't help either.

 

Anyone know the proper way to remove these orphaned files?

 

Carlo

[Carlo 4330]

Just a note, if you try to play one of these files that no longer exist you get a spinner that never stops.

[Luke 37091]

Yes on the next background sync it should see that they're gone and then remove them. Thanks.

[Carlo 4330]

Synced multiple times after this and these orphaned files were never removed.

 

Just a note and I don't know if it makes a difference but these were downloaded with the download button (original) and not via the sync menu.

 

BTW, what's the difference?

 

Carlo

 

PS I fixed this by just wiping the cache and starting over but that would have been a pain in some cases to do.

[softworkz 3338]

The current behavior is actually "as designed".

 

 

An SD card is external storage. External storage is not expected to be present permanently.

 

There are use cases like: You got several SD cards and change between them, you remove an SD card to put it into another device, later you put it back etc.

 

For these reasons, the Emby Sync behavior is applying the following logic:

• A missing SD card will not cause synced item removal
• Autodetection  will only process items that are missing from the actual SD card to which they were saved to

Since you didn't wipe your SD card but instead formatted it, the device recognizes it as a different SD card and Emby can't detect that items were deleted.

 

 

I don't see a way reason to change the current behavior, because that would lead to situations that are a lot worse than this:

 

If we would change this, nobody would be able to remove his SD card anymore without taking the risk that all his locally synced items would be lost.

[Luke 37091]

@@cayars please let us know if this helps. thanks !

[Carlo 4330]

No doesn't help.  Let me explain further and throw out an idea or two to make this process better and more powerful.

New phone, Fresh Emby install.

Download (not sync) button a few movies.

 

Next day can't remove 2 or 3 movies.  There was no delete button on the movies (start of the problem).

This was my dad's phone and I only had a hour to get a couple new movies loaded for him before he left for work so:

 

I formatted SD card.  Removed Emby, Deleted Cache, Resinstalled Emby.  Downloaded 2 movies.

So that's where the "format" came from.

 

I get the reason but when it's the original SD card that hasn't been removed, ejected or anything done with it and there is no DELETE button in Emby that's a problem.

 

Today I tried playing with this again and while trying to download 1 movie the 32 Gb card filled without a successful download.  What kept happening is that Emby would start over with the d/l and use a new file name for the same movie.  That's a problem.  It should either pickup from where it left off or overwrite the existing file BUT NOT rename.  No point in doing this.

 

So today I did another SD card format, cache reset, etc that I did yesterday.  I then installed MX Player and transfered a few movies over for him and just told him to use MX player which just works.

 

Now with all of this said I think this should be changed to work like Plex does on the client which is slick. First you can set "monitored" directories.  If any new video files show up (regardless of transfer method) they get added to the interface.  The client will fetch meta-data if needed and write that data to a local file.  You can then switch out SD cards at will and the content being showing in the UI will adapt to the new media.  Hence nothing will ever get stuck in the UI as it ALWAYS adapts or only shows files that exist on the disc.

 

If it functioned like this then those of us who experience sync/download problems like I mentioned above we can transfer the files over WIFI or cable if needed and they show up in Emby.  This feature is also slick for incorporating pics and movies from the phone itself as well.

 

Carlo

@@softworkz

Edited September 5, 2018 by Luke

[softworkz 3338]

Let's go through this one by one:

 

1. Missing Delete Button
   We recently added the ability to delete local synced items in the same way as it can be done for server items
   This feature should be included in the next update
   .
2. Resumable and error resilient background downloading
   The current version can't do this. But we have already implemented that and testing internally.
   So this feature will arrive soon as well
   .
3. Locally unavailable files
   I understand that this behavior is not optimal.
   A quick and slim solution would be to mark those local files that exist(ed) on a different removable medium as "unavailable" and disallow playback for example.
   We will try to address this soon.
   .
4. Handiing of local files unrelated to the server
   I wouldn't expect this for the near future at least.
   We're aiming to provide a seamless experience across multiple clients and having a client playback arbitrary media content does not fit into this.
   Then it wouldn't be much more than having a player playing content from an SD card - like you were doing already.
   Regarding mid- to long-term plans, I leave this for @@Luke to comment on

[Carlo 4330]

1 & 2 sound good and I look forward to the next release.

3:  If you switch SD cards but your items list doesn't change to reflect the SD card swap I think this will be confusing longer term.  It shouldn't have the same feature set as the server where it "holds" on to the data.  If items is there show it.  If not there don't show it.

 

Personally I see this as a mess for actual syncing.  If I was to queue up 25 items but only 15 fit on the first card and I switch the card and there is free space, now it will sync more items.  I could have a series split over multiple SD cards because of this which would be a pain in the ass.

 

4: Totally understand but you would be surprised how well this work on Plex.  You should try and download the client (don't even need a server) and play with this feature.  They use the same players as Emby so if they can do it so can you guys.

 

Thanks for the update!

Carlo

[AdrianW 1053]

The android app is showing content that I have watched and no longer have on my device - how do I clean it up so only content that exists is showing in the app.

 

If there's a way to remove all trace of downloaded content so I can start over, that would be great. Uninstalling and reinstalling doesn't fix it.

 

Where in the android file system does Emby store it's data? So I can manually delete it to get back to a vanilla install.

[Luke 37091]

Can you please discuss some examples? Thanks.

[AdrianW 1053]

On Emby ser

 

Can you please discuss some examples? Thanks.

 

On Emby server (Sync Jobs) and in the android app (cog icon next to "My Downloads") I can see the content that is currently synced to my phone.

 

But, if I click on "My Downloads" a number of episodes appear that are no longer on the phone. Clicking on the green TV panel (right at the bottom of the list) where you get the series poster view of downloaded shows, I have some series that are no longer on the phone. And there appears to be no way to remove them.

 

I managed to get rid of some by long pressing the poster image and choosing "Delete Media" - but strangely "Delete Media" only appears for some series and not others. (Some show "Play", "Shuffle" and "Delete Media" and others just show "Play" and "Shuffle").

 

I have all my downloaded content on an SD card - but I never remove the card. I did manually delete some content (via a file manager) as nothing I could do in the android app or server would tidy up some of my watched content.

 

I'd like to get rid of everything off the phone and start over, so at least I'd be on a clean slate.

[Luke 37091]

How did you remove them from the phone?

[AdrianW 1053]

How did you remove them from the phone?

 

I deleted some from my SD card using a file manager (Solid Explorer). I deleted some others using the Emby "Delete Media" option (as described above).

[softworkz 3338]

Have you possibly been connected with different Emby Servers or reinstalled the server since you've been using the Emby app for the first time?

[AdrianW 1053]

Have you possibly been connected with different Emby Servers or reinstalled the server since you've been using the Emby app for the first time?

 

Only one server. I've upgraded the server (I'm on beta releases so that happen quite often) but I haven't re-installed it.

 

It's probably not worth trying to figure out what went wrong as I can't remember everything I did.

 

If I could get it to a fresh state with no downloads then I could start over and I keep a closer eye on it and if things start to go wrong again I'll hopefully remember the steps.

 

I do think some of the problems stem from syncing issues - some of which I reported here: Progress syncs incorrectly

[softworkz 3338]

For a clean install, follow these steps:

• Got to settings >> Apps >> Emby
  • Execute "Force Stop"
  • Go to "Storage"
    • Clear Cache
    • Clear Data
  • Go back
• Execute "Uninstall"
• "Shut Down" the device (don't just "Restart")
• Delete all sync jobs for the device at the server dashboard (Home >> "Download & Sync")
• Power on the device again
• Re-Install the Emby app from the store

I don't know which of those steps are actually relevant. But that should do it.

[AdrianW 1053]

Finally got rid of the episodes - thanks.