How to change Collection Type from "Movies" to "Mixed"?

[jwill 28]

When I set up my Media Library, I set the Collection Type for one of my folders as "Movies" because it is mostly movies.

 

However, I have a few TV-show format directories in there because I put miniseries in my movies folder, but they are actually on TVDB as TV shows, so I put a Season 01 subdirectory and the miniseries episodes in there.

 

But since I have the Collection Type as "Movies", MBS does not properly identify the miniseries in TV format.

 

So I think I need to change the Collection Type to "Mixed". Correct?

 

How do I do that?

 

[Luke 42077]

you have to remove and re-add it.

[Redshirt 1487]

To change the collection type you need to delete the collection and then re-add it with the type you want.

[jwill 28]

That's unfortunate. I have 17 drives worth of "Media Locations" in that collection, and it takes a while to enter them all again.

[CBers 7450]

Can't you delete library.db, edit collection.xml to mixed and then rescan?

[Luke 42077]

who wants to hack around like that? just use the tools we've built you. if you think they need improvements, create feature requests.

[moviefan 187]

I thought that the Mixed content option was removed several versions back and had re-organized my collections based upon an earlier suggestion of yours Luke.  

 

Is the plan moving forward to continue supporting this now?

[Luke 42077]

For now but we may re-evaluate the next time we see it causes a problem. We may also restrict the number of types we allow to go into mixed collections. All of the UI developers are focusing their efforts on type-based views though, so my suggestion is not to worry so much about how the folders are organized.

[swhitmore 781]

That's unfortunate. I have 17 drives worth of "Media Locations" in that collection, and it takes a while to enter them all again.

 

Storage Pooling in FlexRAID

[jwill 28]

Storage Pooling in FlexRAID

Which takes even longer to set up and costs money as well.

[swhitmore 781]

Which takes even longer to set up and costs money as well.

 

Worth the time and money imo. FlexRAID was the best decision I ever made for my file server.

[jwill 28]

Worth the time and money imo. FlexRAID was the best decision I ever made for my file server.

 

I am well aware of FlexRAID. It is a waste of money.

 

And it is absurd to suggest it as a solution to the issue I raised in this thread.

[ebr 16169]

I don't think he was suggesting an exact solution - just a way to make your life easier.

 

Personally, I don't see how anyone with a large setup can get by without some sort of drive pooling solution not to mention fault tolerance.  Not a waste of money at all in my book.

[jwill 28]

Personally, I don't see how anyone with a large setup can get by without some sort of drive pooling solution not to mention fault tolerance.  Not a waste of money at all in my book.

 

I'm not sure why you think pooling is necessary for media drives. I just fill them up one at a time. As for reading them, normally I just have to enter them into MB once and then let MB worry about which drive has which files. This case was an exception, where I had to enter them into MB twice because MBS lacks a "change type" command. It looks like the beta from the other night added a button for that function, but it just tells you that you need to delete and re-add, but I am hopeful that it is a placeholder for functionality MBS will do itself in the future.

 

As for fault tolerance, of course I have fault tolerance on my drives. I use SnapRAID. Does not cost a cent, and the author is more responsive to questions than Brahim.

Edited December 4, 2013 by jwill

[ebr 16169]

It just simplifies things greatly.  I just have one "Movies" location, not 13 separate drives/shares all with their own movies location that I have to keep up with.

 

When I need to expand, I pop in a new drive, add it to the pool and done.  All other components involved still work just as they did and don't have to be updated with new locations.

 

For me, this feature is worth $60.  Not necessarily true for all but I bet it is for a great many.

[jwill 28]

It just simplifies things greatly.  I just have one "Movies" location, not 13 separate drives/shares all with their own movies location that I have to keep up with.

 

How does it "simplify things greatly"? You still have to enter all the information for pooling your drives into FlexRAID. I just enter that information into MB instead.

 

And how often do you add a new drive? Are you filling up a drive a week or something crazy?

 

When I add a new drive, I just update the shortcut on my 2 machines which add content, and add one additional drive to the MB list. Takes about a minute. And it only happens maybe twice a year. So you are talking about saving 2 minutes a year.

 

Except that you are not, because FlexRAID is not trouble free. It takes time to setup, as well as time to maintain. And that is if there are not bugs or issues, in which case you can spend far more than 2 minutes a year troubleshooting problems.

 

If I really did need pooling, I could just use aufs or mhddfs.

 

But write pooling is just not needed for media drives, and it is more trouble than it is worth.

Edited December 4, 2013 by jwill

[ebr 16169]

It depends on your environment.  I have more than just MB going on that needs to know where my media is.  Adding a drive to the FR pool is just a couple clicks and then everything else already knows about it.

 

I have one location that lists all my movies in explorer or any other way of looking at it.  I have a single location that my ripping tools need to know about.  A single location that my photo gallery tools needs to know about.  A single location that Sickbeard needs to know about. etc, etc.

 

It's fine if this isn't worth it to you but it is to me and, I'll bet, a lot of other folks with large setups.  And, yes, FR is not the only drive pooling solution.  I wasn't even really talking about FR specifically, just the nicety of having drive pooling.  If you don't want it then fine.  I think a lot of other people would so that's why Scott suggested it and I backed it up.  That's all.

[moviefan 187]

Plus there is the redundancy factor.

 

If you lose a drive in your setup jwii then you lose all the data - unless you are also backing it up which takes more than 2 minutes.and would require you to have twice the storage capacity as you need.

 

If you lose a drive in a RAID configuration you just replace the drive and let the RAID rebuild.  There is significantly less effort involved in this.

[ebr 16169]

He said he has a RAID setup.  We were just discussing the merits of drive pooling.

[moviefan 187]

He said he has a RAID setup.  We were just discussing the merits of drive pooling.

 

Ah indeed I missed that part of his post.  My apologies. 

[swhitmore 781]

I am well aware of FlexRAID. It is a waste of money.

 

And it is absurd to suggest it as a solution to the issue I raised in this thread.

There is no need to be rude. I was simply offering a suggestion. One that may people on this forum swear by, including myself. Never mind, I won't be making that same mistake with you again.

[jwill 28]

There is no need to be rude. I was simply offering a suggestion. One that may people on this forum swear by, including myself. Never mind, I won't be making that same mistake with you again.

There is no need to falsely accuse me of being rude. And there is no need to promote a commercial product in a thread about something that has nothing to do with said product. I am glad to hear you will not be trying to play salesman with me again.

[swhitmore 781]

There is no need to falsely accuse me of being rude. And there is no need to promote a commercial product in a thread about something that has nothing to do with said product. I am glad to hear you will not be trying to play salesman with me again.

Why, because of all the big money I make of suggesting you use someone else's product? Get real mate. We both know you were being rude, and are continuing to do so. I've only ever contributed to this forum to help others and to improve this software to use myself. I don't receive a single thing, other than being involved with a great community. I think you need to have a long hard look at what you are contributing.

[jwill 28]

Why, because of all the big money I make of suggesting you use someone else's product? Get real mate. We both know you were being rude, and are continuing to do so. I've only ever contributed to this forum to help others and to improve this software to use myself. I don't receive a single thing, other than being involved with a great community. I think you need to have a long hard look at what you are contributing.

There is no need to create straw men. I did not accuse you of making money. I was not rude to you. You came into this thread making off-topic comments about commercial software that had no relation to the question I asked in this thread, and now you are taking the thread even more off topic by making accusations against me. If you do not want people to point out that your comments are off topic sales pitches for commercial products, then do not make such posts. I think you need to have a long hard look at whether your posts are adding any value whatsoever to this thread.

[swhitmore 781]

There is no need to create straw men. I did not accuse you of making money. I was not rude to you. You came into this thread making off-topic comments about commercial software that had no relation to the question I asked in this thread, and now you are taking the thread even more off topic by making accusations against me. If you do not want people to point out that your comments are off topic sales pitches for commercial products, then do not make such posts. I think you need to have a long hard look at whether your posts are adding any value whatsoever to this thread.

 

"Salesman" and "Sales pitches" infers that I'm making money off suggesting the product. I'm not. I felt it would help your situation. This was agreed with by others. You are being rude. Plain and simple. It's funny that you are even bothering to try and defend yourself.