Add ability to *move* media from one library to another

[mastrmind11 722]

While being able to logically move media from one library to another would be a nice first step.  Ultimately it would be nice for the move to physically move the media from one folder to another (since doing a logical move for a bunch of media from say, kids to not-kids, and vice versa will make physical locations pretty confusing).  Trying to avoid having to drop into the cli to do it... I don't mind, pure convenience factor, just thought I'd throw it on the queue.  Thanks

 

Latest ATV update is sick, btw.  Well done.

[ebr 16169]

Honestly, I just don't see this as a core function of our system and it carries with it a lot of risk (massively altering the actual media file system locations).  Moving items to different physical locations and/or between libraries is really as easy as moving the files, adjusting the Emby library configuration and running a library scan.  If you store the metadata with the media this will be a pretty fast operation and will preserve any customization you have made.

[mastrmind11 722]

Honestly, I just don't see this as a core function of our system and it carries with it a lot of risk (massively altering the actual media file system locations).  Moving items to different physical locations and/or between libraries is really as easy as moving the files, adjusting the Emby library configuration and running a library scan.  If you store the metadata with the media this will be a pretty fast operation and will preserve any customization you have made.

yeah, point taken, just thought I'd throw it out there in case 

[abegreen 20]

+1

...and move .nfo file alongside as well.

That would be EPIC!

Cheers!

[AdrianW 1058]

-1

How hard is it to use file explorer to cut and paste a folder?

[abegreen 20]

5 minutes ago, AdrianW said:

-1

How hard is it to use file explorer to cut and paste a folder?

Lets say your Emby server is on VPS or Seedbox, and you don't have a full windows environment but just a list of apps that you can install.

If Emby could help to more easily organize libraries, why shouldn't it?

It's a big difference between organizing libraries via SmartTV app and killing your eyes in some remote shell.

 

[Roodee 39]

Hi all,

since I spent some time to illustrate my version of the same request, let me repost it the images along with my description:

I would like to have a function in the user-interface (UI) to move media from one library to another library. I have tried to illustrate an example here (in red):

Currently, I have to do that on a filesystem level, and only I can do that. Adding that to the UI would enable other users to do that as well (with sufficient privileges).

Once the destination is picked, a new dialog should pop up, what the transfer-request should move on the file-system basis:

I hope that my idea is not totally absurd and finds many supporters!

Thank you all!

RooDee

Original Post:

 

[Roodee 39]

Since I just read this thread, let me add my reasoning which may answer some of the replies made here.

As any collection, my collection has been growing over time. With that, it is normal that a collection outgrows the boundaries of the hard drive it once was started on. That in mind, there comes a point in time where one decides to split a collection into separate libraries, like separating TV-shows from movies. This step, which is clearly an administrative step taken in the Emby UI may or will coincide with a step on the hardware layer with the addition of another storage volume / hard drive. I think that the fewest of us can just grow the existing hardware like we would add extra hard drives to a Raid-Shelf, like one would do in a data center. In my case, it is two network-attached hard-drives that I can mount with NFS and two USB hdds that I mount as a CIFS-volume.

Once I have done all my mounting, Emby does not care about the ins-and-outs of underlying the hardware or protocol. The Emby UI hides what lies underneath. It allows viewing as well as administering the underlying collection. Emby already allows media deletion. In my opinion transferring is just the next step.

Again, thank you all!

RooDee

Edited September 21, 2022 by Roodee
Corrected typo and clarified by rephrasing.

[sydlexius 297]

@Roodee Do you use anything like Sonarr or Radarr to manage your shows or movies?  If so, what are the challenges you have with using that to move shows/movies as opposed to Emby?  The reason I ask is that for me (and I'm sure many others), I treat a Library as an abstraction of one or more paths (in my case shares, but it would equally apply to drives), so my first inclination would be to use one of the aforementioned products to handle the moves for me.  I can appreciate the simplicity of doing this from the comfort of your couch, however one of the annoyances will be trying to watch the media as it's being moved...there will be performance issues (this can be just as much a problem with Radarr/Sonarr), which kind of negates some of the benefits of said couch-based administration.

[elpoolet 26]

Hi Everybody

I wanted to add my vote to include this feature (partially) in a next relase.

I'll explain : I got an Emby Server on a Windows 10 PC with 6 HDD (emby resides on a dedicated SSD for metadata).
But the storage amount isn't sufficent, so i adde some years ago a NAS with 2 1To HDD.
Recently, I added 2x3To HDDs.

I re-ordered my shares, my files etc...
My libraries are built with several folders shares

And in order to keep a bit of order on the physical layer, My shares are named like that : 
 - \\srv-smb\sdb-root\Films_M_to_S
 - \\srv-smb\sdd-root\Films_S_to_T
These 2 shares are part of my Library "Films"
 

It would be a great feature to tell Emby not to rescan an entire folder when you move it inside the same Library, or to add the ability to "Move Files and Folders" from a folder inside a library, to an other folder in the same Library ie : 

Move Folder "SAS Rise of the Black Swan - (2021) - [tmdbid=595743]" for the movie "SAS Rise of the Black Swan" from the folder : "\\srv-smb\sdd-root\Films_S_to_T" to the folder "\\srv-smb\sdb-root\Films_M_to_S".
During the moving, playing would be impossible, and after, metadata would be moved but not rebuilt.

Cause rebuilding metadata for dozen of filescould be extremly time consuming (download metadata, images, build preview images every 10 seconds, find episodes intros...)

I'm ready to test this feature if development starts !

 

[Happy2Play 9780]

@Roodee From your example how would it work it there were multiple folders assigned to the library?  So move to Horror would go to what folder if more then one?

Just like example above how would item in same library move to different folder assigned to that library?

From a single folder library setup I can see this but from multi folder library setups a lot more work would need to be done to folder level not library level.

[Roodee 39]

On 10/4/2022 at 2:11 AM, Happy2Play said:

@Roodee From your example how would it work it there were multiple folders assigned to the library?

Well, that is indeed a good question!  It would work for someone who has a flat, one storage-location library.

My movies are

• organized by year,
• unless they are part of collections, in which case they should go into that collection-folder in the same library
• unless they are those movies that should not show in the main library, then they should go into a secondary library, again organized by year

 

I got an example: mp3tag (a well known tool to tag and organize media-files with ID3tags), does actually support placing files into folders based on tags.

mp3tag:  %ARTIST%/%ALBUM%/%TRACK%. %TITLE%
                 "Abba/Arrival/6. Money, Money, Money.mp3"

Back to emby: Given that emby has the tag data, one could define a "per-library-import-string"   

movies:  %library-folder%/%releaseyear%/%title%-(%releaseyear%)-%resolution%/
               /var/emby /1979/Alien-(1979)-1080p/ <filenames>

 

I have to admit, this issue is becoming more and more complex. So, I guess this can be postponed until more critical things are implemented.

Cheers,
Roodee

[Suliamu 36]

I really don't understand why, but my original FR was closed and i was asked to post it here.
This is only for people who do not save metadata in the media-folders and/or have their media-libraries set to read-only. 
And this is not about moving files from their physical locations, but about editing the emby-metadata-library. 
See here the problem:

In order to change the library-path without losing all the (custom) metadata one has to manually edit the paths in the 
emby-metadata-db as seen in the thread. 
Doing it with external tools is in my opinion not a good way to do this task. The only acteur/agent editing the emby-metadata-db should be emby-server itself. 
In order to not have this need for manual intervention in the heart of emby it would be nice to have a option in the backend to start a script which does
such a "rebase of the library-paths". 
The respective functions should all already be more or less there in the emby-server, since you already scan/iterate over files and folders in a folder, take the paths and put it into the emby-metadata-database. 
 

Edited September 14, 2025 by Suliamu

[ebr 16169]

4 minutes ago, Suliamu said:

And this is not about moving files from their physical locations, 

...

In order to change the library-path

Hi.  Changing the library path is effectively (to the computer) changing the files' locations.  So it would be basically the same process.

Thanks.

[Suliamu 36]

2 minutes ago, ebr said:

So it would be basically the same process.

I still have to disagree. 
The original thread starter wants you to move files. 
With functions of the operating system. 
This is dangerous from a programs perspective as you have rightly stated in your comment way up. 

On 10/27/2018 at 3:32 PM, ebr said:

and it carries with it a lot of risk (massively altering the actual media file system locations)

 

This is very different to emby-server altering the emby-metadata-database and just changing paths. 
Paths that point to correct physical locations of files.   
This is the core job of emby-server.  
But it's okay i just might be to stupid for this all and somehow indeed moving files on OS-level is the same as changing entries in a sql-db... 

[ebr 16169]

No, you are correct but, the functional goal is the same.  Your suggestion is more likely to be something we would consider and would be something that is done after one moved the files using other means.

Thanks.