DVR Recordings of shows with no metadata

[sfatula 207]

So, if one has recordings set up for local news, there is no match in any of the metadata providers. At least for my local news. So, Emby seems to break it's own naming convention in this case, as it does not create or store a Season folder. It also does not add a year to the series folder name.

 

Why would emby not create some sort of default season number to maintain the convention? Is there an option, or provider, or something I am missing that would enable Emby to do this?

[Luke 42085]

 

 

So, Emby seems to break it's own naming convention in this case, as it does not create or store a Season folder.

Season folders are not required, so it's not accurate to say that "emby is breaking it's own naming convention".

[Luke 42085]

 

 

It also does not add a year to the series folder name.

Yes we do, if we're able to obtain the series year from the an internet metadata provider, which doesn't exist in this case.

[Spaceboy 2573]

We’ve also found that artwork is incorrectly used in these scenarios and are awaiting a fix from Luke

[sfatula 207]

Season folders are not required, so it's not accurate to say that "emby is breaking it's own naming convention".

 

So, you're saying this page:

 

https://support.emby.media/support/solutions/articles/44001159110-tv-naming

 

It doesn't really say season is not required. It does later say in mixed content dirs, that season is required, which sort of hints at it. Essentially, one might assume if it's required for mixed content, then it's not required for TV. Seems a stretch to assume. 

 

It does say a number of file naming conventions are possible,  all of them have season and or episode number in them. So, you are saying actually, any file with any structure could be put into such a folder. It will just go into season unknown?

 

For long running shows (news), it shows:

 

Common for long-running daily shows, you can also use the date the episode aired.

 

anything_1996.11.14.ext

anything_1996-11-14.ext

anything_14.11.1996.ext

 

But the news recording filename is not one of those formats either. Just trying to see what the rules actually are for naming. Is the knowledge base up to date?

[Luke 42085]

@@cayars can update that, but season folders are not required.

[Luke 42085]

 

 

But the news recording filename is not one of those formats either.

Right and it's not ideal but we have to do the best we can with the data that is available.

[Carlo 4561]

No where does it imply you need/must have season folders, but the knowledge base articles do often show examples that do make use of the season folders as well as "all in one folders". The very first image on that knowledge base article shows how to have articles both with and without the sub directories.

 

Having a system that has tens of thousands of movies and tens of thousands upon thousands of TV shows I can attest that sub directories do make the system faster and easier to browse outside of Emby especially if you have options like NFO and local images turned on which quickly add to the total amount of files present in directories.  This becomes more apparent when using network mounted drives vs local drives.

 

Thus from personal experience running a rather large Emby system I tend to some times lean toward what experience has tought me over the years and that is sub directories are almost always preferable to long listings in a single directory.  This is from both a speed perspective and also the perspective of how Emby works deleting material and finding updates to directories (new show).  So I personally like to lean toward using season folders as the default in examples which is why some of the knowledge base content appears the way it does because I feel it's a "best practice" and worth pursuing long term when building out your libraries. However as explained in the KB articles the name of the files (and not sub directories) is "good enough" for Emby to recognize the content.

 

If you want to have 20 years of "Law and Order" in one directory or 32 seasons of "The Simpsons" in one directory, Emby can certainly handle this just fine as long as file names are correct but (personal bias) I'd suggest you use season folders as this will help you as your system grows in size and complexity.

 

Now with that said, when it comes to live TV and recordings Emby Server does some times store files differently than we may set them up by personal choice.  Emby has to be able to work with all kinds of guide EPG data from very good (built in) to some really crappy sources that come with some IPTV "sources" or 3rd parties. Sometimes you don't even get season/episode numbers, or episodes numbers that don't match the meta providers Emby uses.  Emby Server has to be able to deal with this the best it can.

 

But regardless if you or Emby sets up the directory structure, it can be "all in one" or using season folders.  As long as the episode is identifiable, you are good.

 

Carlo