Misidentified Shows in Home Movies (Scream)

[qrest 0]

I'm writing because of an issue that appeared when I updated my Emby installation. Updating caused my libraries to be reclassified as "Mixed content" and re-scanned, and because of that,  misidentification or incorrect metadata occurred many times. In particular, it seems an entire library was identified as the TV show "Scream" and video files from a plethora of folders were categorized or identified as episodes from that TV show. I should point out that I don't have this particular show in any form in any library whatsoever.

I'm having trouble reversing this issue. In particular, I have uninstalled and re-installed emby-server multiple times, first using apt remove and then apt purge, deleting /var/lib/emby manually, and tried everything else I can think of and search for to no avail.

After I apt purged emby-server, I added a new "Home videos" library at the startup wizard. Even still, after the initial library scan the video files continue to be identified as episodes of Scream. I don't understand where this metadata is coming from. I have even uninstalled the MovieDB and the other DB plugins before adding the library, and still the video files end up being misidentified.

As I understand, this shouldn't be happening at all with a "Home videos" library. Furthermore, with the DB plugins uninstalled, where is it getting the information? Or is there somehow leftover configuration information even after running 'apt purge emby-server'? Can someone please explain this to me? I'm at the end of my rope.

[GrimReaper 4740]

There was no need for such a drastic action and nuking your server, you should've just followed the steps in below post and reverted library type. 

Do you store NFOs with your media, as "Home media" library does not utilise online scrapers, only way I could think of information coming is from those? 

[Luke 42078]

8 hours ago, qrest said:

I'm writing because of an issue that appeared when I updated my Emby installation. Updating caused my libraries to be reclassified as "Mixed content" and re-scanned, and because of that,  misidentification or incorrect metadata occurred many times. In particular, it seems an entire library was identified as the TV show "Scream" and video files from a plethora of folders were categorized or identified as episodes from that TV show. I should point out that I don't have this particular show in any form in any library whatsoever.

I'm having trouble reversing this issue. In particular, I have uninstalled and re-installed emby-server multiple times, first using apt remove and then apt purge, deleting /var/lib/emby manually, and tried everything else I can think of and search for to no avail.

After I apt purged emby-server, I added a new "Home videos" library at the startup wizard. Even still, after the initial library scan the video files continue to be identified as episodes of Scream. I don't understand where this metadata is coming from. I have even uninstalled the MovieDB and the other DB plugins before adding the library, and still the video files end up being misidentified.

As I understand, this shouldn't be happening at all with a "Home videos" library. Furthermore, with the DB plugins uninstalled, where is it getting the information? Or is there somehow leftover configuration information even after running 'apt purge emby-server'? Can someone please explain this to me? I'm at the end of my rope.

Hi there, videos in a home videos library will never be identified as episodes of a series. Why do you think this happened?

[qrest 0]

I believe I have figured out the root of the issue.

Firstly, it should be stated that I did not manually change my "Home videos" library to "Mixed content". However, it appears that when I updated my Emby installation, it automatically changed all of my libraries to "Mixed content". Furthermore, even though I had never manually enabled the option, it appears that it also enabled "Store metadata in media folders" (or whatever that option is). Again I should point out that I never manually enabled this option. As far as I know it isn't even an option on "Home videos" nor is it enabled by default even for "Mixed content" as far as I know. I don't know why this occurred during the upgrade process. Perhaps it is a bug or issue that could be fixed.

So, unbeknownst to me, there were NFO files being stored in the folders for these incorrectly identified video files. Then, when a new library was created, even though it was a "Home videos" library, it utilized those NFO files as the metadata for the videos in question. I'm not sure if that is a bug or the intended behavior as well.

GrimReaper: I don't believe the linked thread is relevant here. The issue wasn't that I couldn't change the content type of the library. My issue was apparently that changing the library from "Mixed content" to "Home videos" or even recreating the library doesn't change the metadata being imported via NFO.

My solution, then, was to use

rm *.nfo
rm */*.nfo
rm */*/*.nfo 

and so on in my media folder to get rid of all latent NFO files and then to uninstall/reinstall Emby (I'm not sure if that was necessary or if a simple library rescan would have sufficed to totally reset the metadata). Now my 'Home videos' library folder is no longer the TV show "Scream" and video files are not misidentified.

Thank you both for your timely responses. And thank you, Luke, for your continued hard work on this amazing project. It is very much appreciated.

[GrimReaper 4740]

22 minutes ago, qrest said:

GrimReaper: I don't believe the linked thread is relevant here. The issue wasn't that I couldn't change the content type of the library. My issue was apparently that changing the library from "Mixed content" to "Home videos" or even recreating the library doesn't change the metadata being imported via NFO.

Of course it's relevant, you should've done that initially instead of apt purging your server, that was not a link to a thread but to a post (arrow in top right corner) with instructions how to change content type back to what initially was. You have not changed your library type from Mixed-content to Home videos - you built a new one of different type. There was no need to rebuild. 

Anyhow, glad you sorted it out, that's why I've asked:

10 hours ago, GrimReaper said:

Do you store NFOs with your media, as "Home media" library does not utilise online scrapers, only way I could think of information coming is from those? 

Cheers

Edited September 6, 2021 by GrimReaper
Typo

[qrest 0]

Grim Reaper: I'm sorry, I should have been more clear. The first thing I did was to manually change the "Mixed content" library to "Home videos" after I noticed something was wrong after updating. It was only after that I resorted to uninstalling completely. In any case, that didn't solve the issue since the metadata was apparently stored as NFO files and then utilized by the "Home videos" library during the rescan.

Thanks!

[Luke 42078]

On 9/6/2021 at 2:36 PM, qrest said:

since the metadata was apparently stored as NFO files and then utilized by the "Home videos" library during the rescan.

Hi @qrest, only because you enabled it. Saving data to nfo files is off by default, so if the server created these files, then it was doing what you asked it to do.

Have your questions been answered?

[qrest 0]

Luke: I'm sorry, but that is simply incorrect. I have never enabled that option myself. For whatever reason, upgrading Emby (from 4.3.1.0 to 4.6.4.0 if that helps you) automatically (as in, without my input or direction) switched my libraries to "Mixed content" and turned on that option by itself. I never turned it on, nor would I ever turn it on, because I don't use the TV show/Movie content detection in the first place, nor would I want any metadata or pictures stored in my media folders in any case.

Perhaps there is a bug in the software that caused this. What I know for sure is that I, myself, never enabled that option, period.

Does that make sense to you?

[Luke 42078]

Hi, I've not heard of this happen before, but in any case, I'm glad the reason for the problem has been identified and it's easy enough to delete the nfo files and start with a fresh new library. Thanks for the feedback.

[qrest 0]

Thank you once again!

[Happy2Play 9780]

23 minutes ago, qrest said:

For whatever reason, upgrading Emby (from 4.3.1.0 to 4.6.4.0 if that helps you) automatically (as in, without my input or direction) switched my libraries to "Mixed content"

This could make since but not positive when the changed from this structure to only the options.xml with contenttype in the xml.  But nfo setting is another story.