Are BIF files still being used?

[EduardoSantos 40]

Long time ago Emby would produce .bif files while scanning libraries. If I'm not wrong these files were to be used when playing on Roku.

Are .bif files still in use or is it safe to delete them?

[speechles 2055]

BIF files can be used in multiple applications now. The BIF creation is also several magnitudes faster than it was. So to answer the question. If they were created long ago, or by any old method, yes, delete them and recreate them to get better quality/timeline to match closer to where you are going to jump when click those. The old can be off anywhere from 0-10 seconds. Usually falling on the always off by 10 seconds side. Never exactly on. The new match pretty much spot on with minor deviance maybe 0-5 seconds. This is much better than the old always 10 seconds off. 

Whether you keep them or recreate them just know most all Emby applications support them. A few exceptions (Apple notably).

[Sammy 790]

Server Dashboard > Library > {pick a library} and click "..." > Edit > Then make sure you've selected the check boxes to make the BIF's:

Edited July 26, 2020 by Sammy

[ThePaladinTech 22]

BIF files can be used in multiple applications now.

Whether you keep them or recreate them just know most all Emby applications support them. A few exceptions (Apple notably).

Apple TV does not support bif files? I know Xbox doesn’t. Is there a current list of streaming devices that do support them?


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[Luke 42079]

On 7/26/2020 at 5:23 PM, ThePaladinTech said:

Apple TV does not support bif files? I know Xbox doesn’t. Is there a current list of streaming devices that do support them?


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Apple TV does not yet, but is planned for the future. Thanks.

[arsia 0]

Hi @Luke

i have 2 questions . 

1)is emby for tizen support bif coz only can use skip back length buttons there

2) on server side how to speed up bif file generating process ? for me taking few mins to generate each file so on huge library gonna take a century to complete.

Thanks 

Edited September 4, 2020 by arsia

[Carlo 4561]

Hi,

BIF file generation is super fast now compared to how fast it used to be and the competition.  What took me 4+months of around the clock BIF generation for my library now takes about 2 days.  It can basically generate the BIFs as fast as it would take to copy the media.

Edited September 4, 2020 by cayars

[arsia 0]

9 hours ago, cayars said:

Hi,

BIF file generation is super fast now compared to how fast it used to be and the competition.  What took me 4+months of around the clock BIF generation for my library now takes about 2 days.  It can basically generate the BIFs as fast as it would take to copy the media.

wow @cayars , you are getting speed as fast as copy media files? it would be around 30~100 MB/s or even more depend on storage type. 

for me max will goes to 4 MB/s on read files. 

How do you use this leverage? are you using some spacific setting ? or something wrong in my side that I cant reach out the speed as urs 

[Happy2Play 9780]

29 minutes ago, arsia said:

wow @cayars , you are getting speed as fast as copy media files? it would be around 30~100 MB/s or even more depend on storage type. 

for me max will goes to 4 MB/s on read files. 

How do you use this leverage? are you using some spacific setting ? or something wrong in my side that I cant reach out the speed as urs 

It takes about 15 seconds for a episode and 30 seconds per movie on my beta system.

2020-09-04 12:36:39.959 Debug App: ProcessRun 'quick-extract-imageseries' Started.
2020-09-04 12:36:46.301 Info App: ProcessRun 'quick-extract-imageseries' Process exited with code 0

2020-09-04 16:41:56.897 Debug App: ProcessRun 'quick-extract-imageseries' Started.
2020-09-04 16:42:24.455 Info App: ProcessRun 'quick-extract-imageseries' Process exited with code 0

I ensure I save with media so it anything happen in Emby it is only a one time creation vs if you don't and anything happens with the database or media goes offline could get purged from Emby and have to be redone.

[Gilgamesh_48 1240]

8 minutes ago, Happy2Play said:

It takes about 15 seconds for a episode and 30 seconds per movie on my beta system.

2020-09-04 12:36:39.959 Debug App: ProcessRun 'quick-extract-imageseries' Started.
2020-09-04 12:36:46.301 Info App: ProcessRun 'quick-extract-imageseries' Process exited with code 0

2020-09-04 16:41:56.897 Debug App: ProcessRun 'quick-extract-imageseries' Started.
2020-09-04 16:42:24.455 Info App: ProcessRun 'quick-extract-imageseries' Process exited with code 0

I ensure I save with media so it anything happen in Emby it is only a one time creation vs if you don't and anything happens with the database or media goes offline could get purged from Emby and have to be redone.

That is my experience as well. Also I completely agree with storing bif files, nfo files and images alongside the video files. I fought that idea for years but, once I set it up, I quickly saw the advantages. For me the biggest advantage is not the avoidance of regeneration but rather it is that fact that support files only need to be generated once. I have multiple servers pointing at the same file structure and storing the support file with the media means that only one copy of all the support gets generated or used and only one server actually has to do the work of generating support files and then the other servers will use it.

Also I do find that the creation of bif files is very fast now. When I add a movie the bif file shows up about as fast as the artwork and metadata shows up often faster.

[Carlo 4561]

My speeds are similar to others here.  All my HDDs are local with the exception of some older TV shows on a NAS.

If your drives are local I'd think things will go faster than if they are on a network share.

The type of CPU you have will come into play as well.  I'm running an i7 3GHz or so speed wise.

@Gilgamesh_48 those all are valid reason to keep the BIF files with the media. It also doesn't hog up all your storage space on your "system" or Emby drives.  The "Other" reason it's cool is if you have a couple of computers you can setup Emby on the 2nd and/or third machine pointed to a library and have it them generate BIF files for you.

So if you have 10K movies, 30K TV Episodes you can turn off BIF processing for TV on the 1st computer so it just processes movies and then setup the 2nd with just a TV show library and have it generate the BIF files.  Sort of cut your processing time in half when first generating them.  I used 4 computers when BIFs were first introduced to get this done and it took me months.  Of course the process in now much faster thanks to softworkz finding a much faster way to process them.  Now it's at least 10 to 20 times faster than it used to be.

[sasagr 1]

On 7/29/2020 at 4:55 AM, Luke said:

Apple TV does not yet, but is planned for the future. Thanks.

Is it supported now?

[Luke 42079]

3 hours ago, sasagr said:

Is it supported now?

It's planned for the future. Thanks.