Unexpected custom metadata folder behavior

[ctfo 0]

Just recently migrated from v3 to v4.2.1, and I'm experiencing an unusual issue with my metadata folders.  NFOs and library art is set to store in media folders.  That works as expected.  Under Library > Advanced, I have the metadata path set to a custom location.  Emby is partially using that location.  If I update a Studio, the updated image goes to /custom-location/metadata/Studio.  However, if I update a person/actor, it goes to /var/lib/emby-server/metadata/People.  I inadvertently discovered this because all my people images are missing from the web GUI, but they download when I click on the person's name (and end up in the /var/lib folder above).  I don't see any relevant errors in the log file (but I'm not an expert here).  I tried changing the metadata folder location, changing it back to my custom location, and restarting emby, but the behavior persists.  The permissions for the folders look correct (and consistent between the People and Studio folder).  Any suggestion on how to resolve this?

 

Also just want to say Emby is a fantastic product, without equal in this space.  Thanks very much for all the effort developing and supporting it.

[Luke 37364]

From 4.3 to 4.2?

[ctfo 0]

From v3.x to v4.2.  I think it was 3.6.  I have a backup somewhere if the specific version is needed.

[ctfo 0]

Also it appears the issue is a bit more complicated than I described.  I notice in the Studio folder, the studio "Amazon" gets stored to my custom path.  The studio "Canal+" goes to /var/lib.

[Happy2Play 8410]

This is a big change in v4.  If you have a old installation that is upgraded Emby should use the original paths in the database for these metadata subfolder locations.  But anything new will reside in in /metadata/library somewhat making all the subfolders in /metadata irrelevant.

 

example

My clean install of current beta only uses /metadata/library, where my older migrated stable server will still reads and uses /metadata subfolders do to their original database paths to that location.

 

In your case I have not seen a issue of not using the customized path for /metadata though.  It would appear that your customized path is not being honored if I am reading this correctly.

 

In v4 all new people will be saved to /metadata/library instead of /metadata/people.  You have to use a the people backup plugin no to be able save and restore them.

https://emby.media/community/index.php?/topic/63331-how-to-backup-people-images-with-beta-going-onwards

 

But with the database migration you may have issues with all of your media being removed and re-added, loosing all of your centralized metadata/images migrating from 3.6 to v4.x.

 

I have not had a chance to do more migration testing but will have to look for the topic where @@Luke has done some.

 

Another side note all my systems are Windows.

[ctfo 0]

Interesting.  The loss of human readable folder structure is a bit of a shame.  From what I can tell, my metadata is being stored using the legacy paths, like "metadata/Studio", sometimes using /var/lib/emby-server as the root of that path (studio "Canal+"), other times using my custom metadata path (studio "Amazon").  My custom metadata path has a folder named "Canal+", it's just not being used since the upgrade.