Deleted mp3 files not removed from library

Plex Media Server Metadata & Adding Files
1

Server Version#: 1.19.2.2737
Player Version#: Plex Web 4.32.1

This morning I deleted almost 500 mp3 files from my hard drive. I then did a Scan Library Files on my Music library. Only about 20 tracks disappeared from the library. I can browse to the other tracks in the Plex player, and when I try to play them, I get an error. Makes sense since they’re not there.

If I select Delete on the track through Plex Web, then it goes away. It would be a significant effort to manually delete all of the removed tracks through the Web UI, though. Any thoughts as to why a Scan is not removing these tracks?

  • danBhentschel
2

Inspect the ‘Add Folders’ tab when you edit yoru music library.
Does any one of the folder paths in there now point to a folder that is no longer there or is completely empty?

3

Thanks. I just looked through all the folders. Every folder is still there and has music files in it. Anything else to check?

  • danBhentschel
4

Does
‘Scan library files’
followed by (only after the scan has finished!) ‘empty trash’
do anything?

5

It tells me “Trash was emptied” but the files are still there.

  • danBhentschel
6

Are you using any “mergeFS” or other exotic ways to mount your media storage?

7

I guess possibly… Plex is running in an LXC container. The media is in a ZFS pool managed by the host OS. The storage is mounted in the LXC config file. Not sure what mounting technology is used under the hood.

  • danBhentschel
8

(With my limited Linux knowledge) I think you are good with ZFS. It is used by many people in conjunction with Plex.

If you have ‘debug logging’ activated in your Plex server, let it do another scan of the music library (and only the music library please!), then let it finish the scan (can sometimes take quite long, with a large library), then fetch the logs (whole ZIP please) and post it here.

9

Okay, scan finished. Thanks for looking at this…

Plex Media Server Logs_2020-04-29_10-34-09.zip (26.7 MB)

  • danBhentschel
10

Do you have a path or filename from one of the deleted items, please?
I am trying to find the right log file, even though you have alredy 30 versions in there. (which is great!)

11

So I’ve been looking through the log a bit after sending it to you. Here is a file of interest:

/storage/music/cool_rock/Enter the Haggis/Gutter Anthems/12 Bury My Demons.mp3

I can see this one mentioned in the log file:

Apr 29, 2020 10:29:55.774 [0x7ffb073dc700] DEBUG - File '/storage/music/cool_rock/Enter the Haggis/Gutter Anthems/12 Bury My Demons.mp3' didn't exist, can't skip.

So it recognized that the file doesn’t exist, but it doesn’t remove it from the library.

  • danBhentschel
1 Like
12

Say, do you have several music libraries?
If so, is any of these folders included in more than one library?

/storage/music/amazon/
/storage/music/cool_rock
13

I have 3 music libraries. The other two are for Christmas music and for school-related music / audio files. Neither of the other libraries overlaps on folders. Each of the other 2 libraries has their own folder for media files.

  • danBhentschel
14

Thanks for your help up to this point. I’ve decided to just bite the bullet and go through my collection deleting the files manually. It won’t take forever.

I have saved off the database in the “weird” state, in case anyone is motivated to contact me for additional debugging in the future. I have also noticed another oddity while manually removing the offending tracks. Some of my albums (especially video game music) have lost the title to all tracks EXCEPT for the files that I deleted. Not sure if this is a clue or not. It’s easy to get the info back by refreshing metadata.

Here is a video illustrating what I mean:

  • danBhentschel
15

Yes, this behaviour is known for albums without a “match”. The cause of which is still unclear, because it is very hard to reproduce and catch evidence in log files.
So far, it is assumed that it happens during the nightly metadata refreshes in Scheduled Tasks.

16

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