Does the Plex Music scanner refresh metadata and re-match during scheduled maintenance periods?

Plex Media Server Metadata & Adding Files
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Server Version#: 1.18.4.2171

I have many albums that remain unmatched, even though it appears that the music library is being scanned during the regular maintenance. Many of the albums are available at MusicBrainz as I have added them myself, have been through the “waiting” period to be officially approved, yet they remain as unmatched albums.

I understand that I can manually match them. I assumed that this would happen automatically, during the maintenance. I have the following settings for “Scheduled Tasks”:

  • Refresh local metadata: enabled
  • Update all libraries during maintenance: enabled
  • Upgrade media analysis during maintenance: enabled
  • Refresh metadata periodically: enabled

In fact, the only options not enabled are for photos and TV guide data, as I have neither on the server.

The albums have remained unmatched for over a month. With all of the scanning of the music library that happens, I would hope that occasionally there is some benefit, and un-matched albums are matched.

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As an example, see the attached screenshot of unmatched albums.

Unmatched_albums
Unmatched_albums1424×300 124 KB

Everyone of those albums can be found at MusicBrainz. In fact, I added all of them myself. I believe they are the only release in the “Release Group,” so there can be no confusion that It could match a different release version.

In all cases, if I choose “Match” (or in some cases “Fix Match”), the proper match is shown instantly as the first selection, at 100%. The cover art I uploaded to MusicBrainz (scans of the 45 RPM record label) are shown as the available cover art.

In addition to the scheduled tasks, the music scanner also appears to scan the unmatched albums each time a new album is added. I added two albums, and two separate scans of the library were initiated. Every unmatched album directory was re-scanned, apparently for no reason, as nothing was matched. From the Plex server logs, 2 of the unmatched albums, with their associated MusicBrainz link:

Album “The Circle is Small / Sweet Guinevere” by Gordon Lightfoot
MusicBrainz link: https://musicbrainz.org/release/732f459a-9004-4805-9b13-07691fafe282

Jan 01, 2020 23:56:24.062 [15284] DEBUG - Scanner: Processing directory F:\Plex Videos\Albums\Gordon Lightfoot\The Circle is Small (parent: yes)
Jan 01, 2020 23:56:24.066 [15284] DEBUG - Skipping over directory 'Gordon Lightfoot\The Circle is Small', as nothing has changed; removing 2 media items from map.
Jan 01, 2020 23:56:24.067 [15284] DEBUG - Activity: updated activity 32b1c0b2-a940-4d07-a5a5-0c32226b37a5 - completed 5.2% - Scanning Music & Videos

Jan 01, 2020 23:55:57.467 [15284] DEBUG - Scanner: Processing directory F:\Plex Videos\Albums\Gordon Lightfoot\The Circle is Small (parent: yes)
Jan 01, 2020 23:55:57.479 [15284] DEBUG - Skipping over directory 'Gordon Lightfoot\The Circle is Small', as nothing has changed; removing 2 media items from map.
Jan 01, 2020 23:55:57.480 [15284] DEBUG - Activity: updated activity 14f68326-854a-40c3-8733-4f9ee625213c - completed 5.2% - Scanning Music & Videos

Album “Carolina in My Mind” by James Taylor
MusicBrainz link: https://musicbrainz.org/release/dd661dfa-a788-48d2-a6c4-84fa56f82c40

Jan 01, 2020 23:55:59.595 [15284] DEBUG - Scanner: Processing directory F:\Plex Videos\Albums\James Taylor\Carolina in My Mind (parent: yes)
Jan 01, 2020 23:55:59.621 [15284] DEBUG - Skipping over directory 'James Taylor\Carolina in My Mind', as nothing has changed; removing 2 media items from map.
Jan 01, 2020 23:55:59.622 [15284] DEBUG - Activity: updated activity 14f68326-854a-40c3-8733-4f9ee625213c - completed 7.4% - Scanning Music & Videos

Jan 01, 2020 23:56:24.906 [15284] DEBUG - Scanner: Processing directory F:\Plex Videos\Albums\James Taylor\Carolina in My Mind (parent: yes)
Jan 01, 2020 23:56:24.910 [15284] DEBUG - Skipping over directory 'James Taylor\Carolina in My Mind', as nothing has changed; removing 2 media items from map.
Jan 01, 2020 23:56:24.911 [15284] DEBUG - Activity: updated activity 32b1c0b2-a940-4d07-a5a5-0c32226b37a5 - completed 7.4% - Scanning Music & Videos

My interpretation of the logs is probably not very accurate. But I’m pretty sure I see that the unmatched albums were scanned, and nothing was done.

So a couple of questions:
Why bother scanning the unmatched albums during the scheduled tasks if available matches are not applied?
Why scan all of the unmatched albums every time new media is added? The server is configured to only scan the folders that have changed.

I would appreciate any insight. I actually like the new music system, but there seems to be a lot of bugs that are basically ignored.

Attaching logs, hoping someone will give me the correct interpretation, and a way to “match” that isn’t completely manual. Thanks in advance.

Plex Media Server Logs_2020-01-02_00-38-52.zip (5.3 MB)

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Two things are obvious.

  • Plex doesn’t refresh metadata for music during scans that occur during the maintenance schedule.
  • The music scanner/agent doesn’t try to match albums that are unmatched during any scan, even if the files contain the embedded MusicBrainz ID tags that are supposed to be supported.

As I mentioned in my first post in this thread, the settings for “Scheduled Tasks” I have enabled should, I expect, be doing something to try and match. If not, there’s doesn’t seem to be a point in scanning the library, except to verify the files still exist.

There are two settings in the “Scheduled Tasks” for metadata, which should take care of the problem. Refresh local metadata every three days and Refresh metadata periodically.

I don’t know what time frame Plex uses for “periodically” but I have deliberately left albums unmatched for 3-4 weeks, to see if they ever become matched. Sadly, they never do. But I can can get a match instantly, if I “Refresh Metadata” manually, or if I manually “Match” or “Fix Match”

I don’t add new music to the library until I have made sure it is available at MusicBrainz. If it isn’t, I add the album to their database, then wait 2-3 days (or more) before I add it to my library. The files are all tagged with Picard, and contain every possible MusicBrainz ID for album, track, artist, etc. Albums still come up “unmatched” and as far as I can see, there is no indication that they will ever be matched, until it is done manually.

I have tried my best to make sure the new music system works in a way that was supposed to be “Awesome” I’ve taken the extra steps to add info at MB, I’ve completely re-organized the files/folders to make sure they follow the guidelines, and gone through the complete library to make sure the embedded metadata is accurate.

I’m truly disappointed that Plex refuses to acknowledge any of the “shortcomings” or “bugs” users have reported - excessive scanning at the top of the list (my pet peeve), reported in several threads. In fairness, there’s a lot of assistance provided to help people make the system work, but reports of “bugs” are ignored.

I’ll provide logs again, the scheduled maintenance occurred just before I downloaded the logs, and the music library was scanned. No albums were matched. Hoping someone actually looks at them, verifies the library was scanned, and considers it might be a problem worth looking into.
Plex Media Server Logs_2020-01-14_02-26-01.zip (5.2 MB)

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Asking again. Not sure why this is such a hard question to answer.

If Plex does refresh music metadata and try to re-match, then something’s wrong with my system, and I will do my best to fix it.

If Plex doesn’t, then I would think that’s a bug or an oversight, because all of the settings I have are supposed to do just that.

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