VirtualTV plugin

[pünktchen 1409]

On 2/18/2026 at 7:38 AM, jansipi said:

The plugin doesn't appear in my catalogue.

Under which section did you look for the plugin?

[RSTMU 0]

Hello!

Apologies in advance, I am much less knowledgeable than the average Emby user, it's a miracle I've muddled my way this far! I feel way out of my depth setting this up to be honest, so please be patient...

I set up a pretty basic (so I think...) Virtual TV Channel, just 10 seasons of the Simpsons or so. I think I have all the settings correct, I added an API, and have tried toggling almost everything on and off, but nothing will get the Virtual TV channel to start in Live TV.

I've generated (and re-generated) an API key, I tried refreshing the TV guide and resetting the server, and I have an active subscription to Emby.

At first, the episodes were not all the same audio/video format, so I converted them all, and I made sure that the format that they converted into is the same as in the settings. However, the Live TV is still not playing... I just get a perpetual loading ring. It's been there for 12 minutes now...

What am I doing wrong?

\

Here are some of my settings:

Edited February 20 by RSTMU

[pünktchen 1409]

1 hour ago, RSTMU said:

At first, the episodes were not all the same audio/video format, so I converted them all, and I made sure that the format that they converted into is the same as in the settings. However, the Live TV is still not playing... I just get a perpetual loading ring. It's been there for 12 minutes now...

I hope you've done a library scan and (forced) guide refresh after converting your episodes?!

1 hour ago, RSTMU said:

What am I doing wrong?

In the end, only some (debug) logs will tell us the story. Have you also tried some other browser or a dedicated Emby app? Why you've chosen "Continous" as playback mode?

[RSTMU 0]

5 minutes ago, pünktchen said:

I hope you've done a library scan and (forced) guide refresh after converting your episodes?!

In the end, only some (debug) logs will tell us the story. Have you also tried some other browser or a dedicated Emby app? Why you've chosen "Continous" as playback mode?

I've definitely done a library scan, and I /think/ I've done a forced guide refresh? Possibly just a guide refresh, but I'll redo. I'll add that the channel appears normally when I check the channel guide, and shows which episode should be playing.

I will also try other apps. I know it's the same on Android. I chose continuous because I love the idea that the channel is 'playing' in the background, and I can turn it on and catch something random mid-episode, like on cable. Is there another way to achieve this?

I will say though that I tried 'playback mode', and all I got was the minute long black screen that's meant (right??) to be there, but no actual media (afterwards it went right to another minute of nothing).

[pünktchen 1409]

10 minutes ago, RSTMU said:

I chose continuous because I love the idea that the channel is 'playing' in the background, and I can turn it on and catch something random mid-episode, like on cable. Is there another way to achieve this?

Playlist Playback (Live).

15 minutes ago, RSTMU said:

I will say though that I tried 'playback mode', and all I got was the minute long black screen that's meant (right??) to be there, but no actual media (afterwards it went right to another minute of nothing).

There could be several reasons for the failure, like a missing websocket connection because of a wrong configured reverse proxy or Emby sends the playback command to the wrong client if multiple are used on the same device. Or it's just the same underlying problem as with Continuous Playback.

[RSTMU 0]

Hurrah! I refreshed everything, and now using Playback (Live) works! is the only difference between Playback (Live) and Continuous (Live) that Cont. creates a large file to play back from? is there any downside to using Playback?

Thanks for the help!

[TariqK 6]

On 21/02/2026 at 01:24, RSTMU said:

Hurrah! I refreshed everything, and now using Playback (Live) works! is the only difference between Playback (Live) and Continuous (Live) that Cont. creates a large file to play back from? is there any downside to using Playback?

Thanks for the help!

I would like to know this too. Playlist (Live) seems perfect but I dont want to add too much extra overhead on my server. How does it work in the background? Is it just keeping an eye on the time a show starts and putting us at the point of the show depending on the current time when we click on the channel?

i.e. no extra overhead?

Edited February 25 by TariqK

[hdsuisse 14]

On 2/15/2026 at 5:28 PM, pünktchen said:

@hdsuisseThe problem only occurs occasionally, right? I think i know what's happening. I'm maybe a little bit to aggressive when it comes to deleting old files and folders of a stopped streaming session. When you switch to a new channel, after a delay of 20 seconds, the plugin deletes all leftovers from the previous channel and also empty folders. Occasionally this cleanup process will also delete things from the new streaming session. Until this is fixed by me, you should let your channels play for at least 30 seconds.

Hi pünktchen. Did you find a solution for this? 

greetings

[jeffstified 0]

On 2/13/2026 at 1:48 PM, pünktchen said:

As a first test you could try to find out if the plugin request really does not return anything or if it just times out:

1. Edit/create a VirtualTV channel
2. Open the browser developer tools by hitting F12 on your keyboard and switch to the network tab
3. Change/select an Emby user under Common Conditions of the channel settings
4. Look for the status code and response of the queries in the network tab of the browser developer tools

I'm having the same issue that MarkE had. If I select rules for Channel Content Source, then under Rules>Include items from selected Folder(s): there is nothing there to select. Same issue for Bumpers, too. I did the above and there was a POST with a 204 status code and a GET with 200.

I have a user selected and I generated a new API key.

Emby Version 4.10.0.5 and VirtualTV 2.1.7.4

[pünktchen 1409]

15 minutes ago, jeffstified said:

I did the above and there was a POST with a 204 status code and a GET with 200.

Was the response of the get request just empty?

[pünktchen 1409]

On 3/1/2026 at 1:09 PM, hdsuisse said:

Hi pünktchen. Did you find a solution for this? 

greetings

I'm waiting for help from the Emby devs.

[jeffstified 0]

Yes, I think so. If I double click on it in the dev tools, it opens a new tab with a pair of brackets.

This is in the log file:

 

2026-03-12 13:24:49.351 Debug VirtualTVConfigurationService-0HNK0AC1NOAUN:00000028: http/1.1 GET http://10.10.30.231:8096/emby/VirtualTV/VirtualChannelPreview/VirtualTV-be38482912d648328c2142a741a14f1e?X-Emby-Client=Emby Web&X-Emby-Device-Name=Firefox Windows&X-Emby-Device-Id=de12bebe-561d-4582-9261-ff301ee0439f&X-Emby-Client-Version=4.10.0.5&X-Emby-Token=x_secret2_x&X-Emby-Language=en-us. Source Ip: host1, UserAgent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64; rv:148.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/148.0
2026-03-12 13:24:49.351 Info VirtualTV: TVService > Channel: Cooking, GetPrograms, Content type: TVShows
2026-03-12 13:24:49.351 Info VirtualTV: TVService > Channel: Cooking, GetEpisodesFromRules, Returning TVShows based on Rules
2026-03-12 13:24:49.351 Info VirtualTV: TVService > Channel: Cooking, GetEpisodesFromRules, WatchedState, Time: 0.000 sec
2026-03-12 13:24:49.351 Info VirtualTV: TVService > Channel: Cooking, GetEpisodesFromRules, Tags, Time: 0.000 sec
2026-03-12 13:24:49.351 Info VirtualTV: TVService > Channel: Cooking, GetEpisodesFromRules, No Episode Items match the Channel Conditions
2026-03-12 13:24:49.351 Info VirtualTV: TVService > Channel: Cooking, GetPrograms, Returning 0 TVShows Items
2026-03-12 13:24:49.351 Debug VirtualTVConfigurationService-0HNK0AC1NOAUN:00000028: http/1.1 Response 200 to host1. Time: 1ms. GET http://10.10.30.231:8096/emby/VirtualTV/VirtualChannelPreview/VirtualTV-be38482912d648328c2142a741a14f1e?X-Emby-Client=Emby Web&X-Emby-Device-Name=Firefox Windows&X-Emby-Device-Id=de12bebe-561d-4582-9261-ff301ee0439f&X-Emby-Client-Version=4.10.0.5&X-Emby-Token=x_secret2_x&X-Emby-Language=en-us.
2026-03-12 13:29:46.106 Info VirtualTVConfigurationService-0HNK0AC1NOAUS:00000001: http/1.1 POST http://10.10.30.231:8096/emby/VirtualTV/VirtualChannel/VirtualTV-be38482912d648328c2142a741a14f1e?X-Emby-Client=Emby Web&X-Emby-Device-Name=Firefox Windows&X-Emby-Device-Id=de12bebe-561d-4582-9261-ff301ee0439f&X-Emby-Client-Version=4.10.0.5&X-Emby-Token=x_secret2_x&X-Emby-Language=en-us&reqformat=json. Source Ip: host1, UserAgent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64; rv:148.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/148.0

 

 

I think the problem is that I can't specify a folder like /media/tv

[pünktchen 1409]

9 minutes ago, jeffstified said:

I think the problem is that I can't specify a folder like /media/tv

Of course the empty dropdown is your problem. I will again add some further logging around that funtion in a new Dev version.

[pünktchen 1409]

@hdsuisseThere's a new Dev version 2.1.7.5 in the plugin catalog that should fix your problems. I've also added a new playback mode "Native (Live)". Maybe that is a better alternative to "Continuous Playback"?! Please test that version after manual install from the plugin catalog and report your findings.

[pünktchen 1409]

@jeffstifiedThere's a new Dev version 2.1.7.5 in the plugin catalog that you have to install manually. With that version, enable debug logging in the plugin settings, create or edit a VirtualTV channel, select or change the Emby Library User in the channel settings and send me the log after that.