Emby Separating Folders Sub-library in 4.9

[spard4 12]

The "auto jump through single item folders" feature does not work when those folders are inside a collection (and opened from within it). So in the end, I actually have no way to solve my problem, which is a major issue for me.

[Luke 42077]

4 minutes ago, spard4 said:

the ability to group items into collections inside folders.

Yea in hindsight with the goal of making the folder view more accurate, this probably shouldn't have been added. But it's there, so it is what it is. Sorry I understand that's not the answer you're looking for.

Folder view for a long time has tried to straddle both ways of being a semi-accurate folder list while also providing the same kind of metadata features that other screens have. That's the special sauce I was referring to. I think it's taken this as far as it can and at this point in order to keep evolving it has to pick one way or the other.

For example, it's also been reported (and been in my head for a while), that you can't easily spot folders in folder view. Yes there is an icon, but it's not really enough. So for this reason I think we should do what most file browsers do and display a big folder icon with the image inside. But obviously those who use folder view for something other than seeing raw files are not going to like that.

So you see it's hard to toe the line both ways. That's why my feeling is let folder view be a folder view, and then we can add features to other screens to give you what you need.

[spard4 12]

I understand, and thank you for your reply. The only way to restore proper usability would then be to merge the Movies and Shows tabs into one, add the ability to group items by collections within it, and also allow placing collections inside other collections.

That way, there would be no more need for the folder view.
Do you think this will be possible?

[Luke 42077]

14 minutes ago, spard4 said:

I understand, and thank you for your reply. The only way to restore proper usability would then be to merge the Movies and Shows tabs into one, add the ability to group items by collections within it, and also allow placing collections inside other collections.

That way, there would be no more need for the folder view.
Do you think this will be possible?

Nested collections are a bit more complex, but everything else yes.

[cptlores 40]

Might I suggest that when introducing new features that can result in large changes for the user, don't force it on the users as the default setting just because it is new and shiny.

I.e. the merge folders option should have been on by default, since that would cause the least breakage from established behavior.

And then you leave it up to the users to select if they want the new and shiny option.

[mrmixed 77]

But the issue is that the configuration option they gave us isn't a complete toggle.  It eliminates a click from a UI perspective, but does not address the fact that single-title-folders are now treated differently than they were before.

I'm still trying to understand why this change to Folder View was implemented.  Folders were obvious before, except for single-title-folders.  And I don't understand the need to now identify single-title-folders as "folders" instead of "titles".  I'm not sure who that serves--if you're just trying to make it easy for someone to find their file in the filesystem, it's still pretty obvious what parent location it is in, and the full path can be displayed in the file info block.  Moreover, you could've thrown a folder icon on the image without changing how it actually worked.

[cptlores 40]

I agree. It seems like a strange thing to spend time and resources on for questionable improvements, when there are so many other more requested things to improve.

[yetisquatch 2]

I joined this forum specifically for this topic.  The update broke my mixed library folder view.  Ive gotten it mostly back to normal with some CSS to hide the folder/type icons on all the poster images; as well as the turning on the 2 optional settings mentioned in above posts.  It still looks broken while viewing on my Roku TV though as images all have grey framing and I cant remove the file/type icon on images from Roku.

Luke... 100% need the Movies/TV tab (preferably as the first tab) in mixed libraries that functioned just like the folders tab did before.

BTW, you guys probably dont get enough praise... so great job on a great program!

[mrmixed 77]

I think I may be missing something, but merging Shows and Movies into a single tab does not seem to be the same thing as restoring Folder View.  At least, not if you don't automatically group into collections.  I can't speak much as to what that setting does, since I have it turned off and use folders to categorize my mixed content library, and add titles to collections manually.

"Folder View" is an organized hierarchy based on the underlying folder structure.  

"Movies" pulls out everything at any folder level that isn't identified as a TV Series and dumps it out as a top-level title.  "TV" does the same thing but for series.

If you have previously relied on Folder View to establish a organized content layout , and are not automatically grouping everything into Collections, "Movies" is a very large and unwieldly list of titles.  It would not have the implicit grouping/categorization of the underlying Folder structure that a select few of us used to rely on.  The idea to combine Movies and TV under one tab seems to be the dev's pitch to allow us to have all of our content in the same view like Folder View offers, but the hierarchical organization would not be the same.

I'd rather see Folder View restored to it's glorious former self and create some alternate "File System View" to accomplish what Luke is talking about above.

 

[mrmixed 77]

On 10/3/2025 at 1:58 PM, Luke said:

Nested collections are a bit more complex, but everything else yes.

But nested collections are absolutely necessary in order to replicate the view that is available with the old Folder View.

I would rather have the old Folder View than nested collections, honestly (although nested collections would still be great).  But it would take a lot of work to create all of the collections and subcollections to match the folders and subfolders I already have in my filesystem.  It's much less useful.

 

Cross-posting to the discussion on the related topic:

 

[mrmixed 77]

On 10/3/2025 at 1:05 PM, Luke said:

Yes and this behavior alone is extremely complicated and is often the primary reason for library scan anomalies - things not showing up when they should or vice versa, etc. Plus it led to a folder view that really wasn't an accurate folder view.

I think the problem is you don't actually want a real folder view. You want the special sauce folder view from the old Media Browser days. I understand that, but this is more flexible for more people. An accurate folder view is what most people expect when they click on Folders.

To try and save you the extra click layer we added the option to auto jump through single item folders. The next step would be merging Shows and Movies into a single tab.

To reiterate yet again for context, I've only been using Emby since 4.7, and immediately set up a mixed content library viewed primarily through Folder View, because it's just the natural way I want to organize my comparably small, heavily curated collection of mostly digitized family-oriented DVDs but also a bunch of other random videos that are neither movies nor TV.  From everything I have read on this forum, it sounds like you have been trying to eliminate or at least limit the collapsing folder functionality since around that time, but it somehow was working then, and it was great.

I played around with other types of libraries and configurations, but nothing looked as good--or was as convenient to set up--as the mixed content library, navigating through Folder View.

Because of limitations with Emby displaying VOBSUB subtitles through Direct Play, I still occasionally jump out of Emby and play a movie directly from my TV's media player app.  It is exceedingly helpful to use Folder View to navigate content, because I can find the same titles very easily in the media player by following the same folder navigation path.

 

In my initial setup, I did often encounter library scan anomalies, but these were absolutely all my fault, as I only grudgingly started adopting most of the folder/file naming conventions.  It was annoying to have to put in a "Season 01" subfolder for a single-season TV show (or worse, multiple "Season" folders to accommodate a one-off DVD of a handful of scattered Peppa Pig episodes), but it was a reasonable compromise to make it work.  (I did find a neat alternate solution that involved having two different libraries pointing to the same filesystem folders, but it was clear it was not a supported approach and it was far too easy to blow up the entire thing when refreshing metadata.)

I occasionally have still have minor issues with library scanning, but these are also all my doing--sometimes I will create what is intended to be a multi-title folder (e.g. "animated/Super Mario Bros") but only store a single movie in it (e.g. "Super Mario Bros, The (2024)"), and this doesn't always appear correctly.  But I'm doing this deliberately, because it's the first movie in what I expect is going to be a new franchise that my kids will eventually want to acquire more titles for when they come out.  But anytime that the folder name exactly matches the filename for a single-movie-title, or a folder contains multiple titles, there are no problems.

I don't understand what are the library scan anomalies that you reference above.  It seems to me that this would only happen if the folder name for a single-title-folder doesn't match the underlying movie filename.  But this is a naming convention issue--not something that Emby needs to be changed to deal with.  What other library scan problems occur here that you are trying to fix? 

 

On 9/25/2025 at 2:43 PM, Luke said:

That's by design. It makes the folder view more accurate, no? 

Eventually browsing TV via folder view will behave this way.

While I don't disagree that the folder view is more accurate, it's a pointless (and for me, very much unwanted) sort of accuracy.  I don't need an extra folder layer in Emby to help me navigate the file system, if Folder View can get me to my "animated" folder, I know that everything I see in Emby is going to appear in my filesystem under the "'animated/" directory--whether as a file or a subfolder.  At that point, I'm good.  I know where I am, and I know where my title is lives in the filesystem.

You say you intend to do the same thing to TV.  What is the value of having to drill into separate "Season 01" and "Season 02" folder layers in Folder View to view the episodes?  It's just many more clicks, and for what purpose? 

You say this is more flexible for more people, but who wants it?  If you're a server admin, you can just see folders directly in the filesystem, and if you're not an admin, why do you care about having extra folder metadata layers into Folder View?

Creating the folder layers in Folder View doesn't serve any useful purpose except to ruin the use of Folder View for actually navigating and playing titles, and it is not fixed by the new drill-down option because it's the folder metadata itself that is the problem--it makes it impossible to sort single-title-folders alongside individual titles that are just files without a containing folder.  And it's Emby's naming convention for movie extras which requires single-title-folders in the first place.  Further, a combined Movies&TV tab on mixed library does not fix the problem, because there's no way to nest collections to recreate nested subfolders--and even if there was, it would be painfully tedious to configure.

 

I hear you when you say that you think this setting is holding you back from evolving Emby in a new direction, but I don't understand how inserting unnecessary folder metadata layers (which are inherently crippled by having limited fields) is beneficial for anyone, nor do I understand what the application is evolving to.  And I'd like to know that sooner rather than later, so I can make decisions about how best to go about fixing my wrecked 4.9 server.

 

[mrmixed 77]

I know this issue is being covered in a few different posts at this point, but it is disappointing that it has been over a month and there is still no significant engagement from the devs to address the actual problem. 

@Zelig has helpfully started a new post to consolidate this issue.  Please add your support there. 

I don't know how many people are following this topic, so I will politely mention all of the posters here who have either already stated their support for fixing this problem, or at least are directionally aligned with not breaking things in the software that used to work.  Not that I want to put words in anyone's mouth or attribute any particular position.  I'm just asking everyone here to please read the new post. 
 
Anyone who wants to see this changed back, or just wants the devs to attempt to make a really convincing explanation as to why this is an improvement, please look at the new post and give it a +1 (and perhaps also a comment if you are feeling exceptionally passionate). 

@Halliphax
@xLifu
@spard4
@cptlores
@yetisquatch

[Luke 42077]

On 10/3/2025 at 1:43 PM, spard4 said:

The only way to restore proper usability would then be to merge the Movies and Shows tabs into one

@spard4

Sounds like a plan !

[Luke 42077]

Hi, an option is being added for the next release to allow you to control this:

Thanks.