Server Version#: 1.20.1.3252 Linux x64 (CentOS 7)
Player Version#: 8.7.1.20931
Threads on this topic are mostly a few years old. I’d like to refresh this topic please. It is a regular source of nervousness and frustration for me.
Up until yesterday, my Sony Bravia TV could see my Plex Server when it wasn’t logged in.
I stopped logging in my clients because I have occasional internet outages, and when my logged in clients can’t see the internet they stop working right, even though I have all the right settings on my server for allowing unauthorized logins on the local network. Also when an app is logged in, and the internet goes out, the app won’t log out either! So I can’t just log out when the internet goes out, because once it is out, they won’t log out. So I have to always have them logged out. If I try logging out once internet is down, they usually become unresponsive.
So, up until now, with my clients not logged in - if the internet goes out I don’t even notice.
This approach shouldn’t be necessary (apps should still be able to work when the internet goes out, logged in or not). But as a workaround, it was working fine, until yesterday. My Sony Bravia Android TV showed the local server tabs with the exclamation yellow triangle icon and said it couldn’t connect. Then on a relaunch, the tabs for my local server went away entirely.
Sigh.
I searched the app forever in the settings and login section, and found no way to point it to my local server explicitly.
What happened?
I recall there used to be a way to add a local server explicitly, by IP address. This option SHOULD still be around in the sign-in screen of the app (or settings). I also pored through the settings portion of the app to no avail. I just can’t see my local server without logging in anymore!
I wouldn’t mind always signing in - if the app and local server just worked when the internet went out.
There are server settings that imply that Plex supports local-only no internet setups.
DOES PLEX ACTUALLY HAVE THIS FEATURE AS A REQUIREMENT ANYMORE OR NOT? Where this feature is the ability to:
(1) Run a local setup without the internet with all supported client types and
(2) Be able to KEEP running your local setup when the internet is down.
If the feature doesn’t work all the time, with or without the internet, with or without sign-ins, on every device, it is not being properly supported and Plex doesn’t meet this requirement!
If PLEX team could just come out and say “we support this use case” or “we don’t support this use case”, that would be really helpful. But this half working, half baked approach to it just frustrates me (and many others as evidenced by forums). Commit to the requirement and GET IT WORKING, or admit you cannot or won’t, and explicitly indicate that is isn’t supported, and stop half supporting it.
I hope I’m just doing something wrong, but I can’t seem to figure it out.
