Question about Mixed Content

[moviefan 187]

I have a question I am hoping will be a simple answer for someone before I go through the whole process of rebuilding my library.

 

I have always kept my libraries specific to either TV Show or Movies.

 

I have now reached the point where I have so many TV Show documentaries (which are combined with all of the rest of my TV shows) that I would prefer to combine these with my Documentaries library (which is a movies library) to make browsing TV shows easier.  I went to do some testing on this and when I try to change my Documentaries collection to mixed content it tells me I need to rebuild the whole thing.

 

Before I take this step since it will take a very long time to rebuild, I was hoping to understand what limitations, if any, I will face by having a mixed content library versus having it content specific.

 

Can anyone help me understand this better?

 

Thanks.

[Happy2Play 9785]

With the folder detection change that happened in 4.1.0.26, I don't think there is that much of a difference now except for presentation as Mixed Content is folder view.

[moviefan 187]

presentation as Mixed Content is folder view.

 

Thanks for the quick response.  What exactly does that statement mean though?  If I go into the series will it not show all of the episodes and or seasons like it does now?

[One2Go 120]

With the folder detection change that happened in 4.1.0.26, I don't think there is that much of a difference now except for presentation as Mixed Content is folder view.

At present I am running 4.0.1.0 and have not updated because of my Documentary library being Mixed Content and being able to display the Legacy Folder view in EMC. In other words a Movie folder contains several other folders of movies that normally would be a collection. With 4.1.0.26 how does that effect the Legacy folder view?

 

Like the O.P. I have in the Documentary library under one top folder TV shows, including BDMV folders in their season folder, Movie Folders as well as Top folders that have below them TV Show folders, Single Movie folders and Movie folders with sub folders. My BBC Top folder has a plethora of sub folders of the just mentioned format but only one poster "BBC" shows in the video wall. Once clicking on the BBC view a list of its content is being displayed in a List View.

 

I have not updated the server because I am afraid that the displaying in EMC will break. Any light to shed on how this folder detection change may effect this mixture of folders and formats?

[Luke 42089]

Yes they are detected similarly now. Where would you put the movies?

[Happy2Play 9785]

Thanks for the quick response.  What exactly does that statement mean though?  If I go into the series will it not show all of the episodes and or seasons like it does now?

 

Mixed Content does not have the additional headers/presentation like TV or Movies do (Movies/Suggestions/Trailers/Collections/Favories/Genre/Folders).  You are presented the same as you would if you selected the Folders tab.

 

But in the end it will be about the content structure.

[Carlo 4561]

I'd suggest setting up a test server and copy 3 or 4 movies and TV show folder to a location you can use for testing.

Create a new mixed "Documentary" library on the test server with the COPIED content and set the library up with all the normal settings you would use for subs, index/bif, etc

 

With only a handful of media present it won't take long to build the library with all the proper graphics, bif files, subs, etc and you will be able to then look at the finished product and test the views with different devices you have.

 

You may or may not like the finished product.  I for example prefer to keep these separate as I prefer the functionality of pure Movie and TV libraries and not so much of the mixed library approach.  Emby gives you the choice of using different library types so if you have experienced a library type that is out of the norm, I'd suggest trying it (hopefully on a test server) so you can experience and test it out yourself before committing to using it.  This is plenty easy to do with Emby.

[moviefan 187]

I just took the plunge and redid the libraries last night.  As far as I can tell, everything looks the same as it did besides a bunch of my dates added getting messed up which I think was unrelated.

 

The TV Documentary series are even still auto organizing correctly so seems like a win.

 

Also, the library rebuild was dramatically quicker than it used to be.  Like 50 times quicker.

Edited May 2, 2019 by moviefan

[skidmarks 199]

I haven't given it a try recently.  But i ended up deciding it was better for me to have two separate libraries.  I dont remember what made me do this, think it might have been episode numbers.  So i made a Documentary folder that is used for media with a movie structure and an Educational library where i put things that had a tv folder structure.

 

I wish i remembered why i felt the need to set it up this way.  I was also attempting to merge documentary related media together.

 

I look forward to see how this works if you try merging your files together.

 

It was strange because I do use a mixed content folder for Music Concerts and Music Documentaries and it works great.  Think it is because there are no seasons in that media.

Edited May 2, 2019 by skidmarks