Server Version#:1.42.2.10156-f737b826c
Player Version#:n/a
Tuner Make/Model: HdHomeRun Quatro
Guide/Lineup name: all
Using XMLTV?: no
Channel number/Name: all
<If providing server logs please do NOT turn on verbose logging, only debug logging should be enabled>
My EPG has not been updating automatically. I first noticed this before Thanksgiving. Kind of attributed it to the holidays plus change over from Nov. to Dec. My Tivo had the same issue at the time. Both had EPG up til 12/4. Around Thanksgiving, I noticed my Tivo updated but not Plex. I restarted PMS and it pulled data until 12/9.
Well, no updates since. I’m still stuck with EPG until mid-day 12/9. Something seems stuck but not sure what. I haven’t changed any settings (that I know of). My plan right now is let the EPG clears as much of itself out in case something there is messing things up. Worst case I do a manual refresh on 12/8.
I’ve included logs in case something shows up there.
Your logs are showing the butler starting at 2:00am, and ending at 5:00am, but I don’t see the butler initiating any of the maintenance tasks at all. For example, when the EPG refresh is initiated there should be a line with the text “RefreshEpgGuides". If you go to Settings→Scheduled Tasks are at least some of the scheduled tasks checked? What is the backup directory set to, and verify that you aren’t low on disk space where the backup directory is set. Also, if you go to Settings→Manage→Live TV, and then click on “DVR Settings”, scroll to the bottom of the screen that comes up, is “Perform refresh of program guide data checked?
Pending any findings, I’d suggest manually cleaning bundles, manually run a database optimization, and then restart the Plex server service.
Thanks for taking a look. Yes, scheduled tasks are set to run from 2am→5am. All scheduled tasks are selected except “Update all libraries during maintenance”
backup dir is “/var/lib/plexmediaserver/Library/Application Support/Plex Media Server/Plug-in Support/Databases” /var is 3% full
Yes, refresh of program guide data is checked.
What is involved with cleaning bundles and doing a database optimization? I do have ChuckPA’s DBrepair utility downloaded. I’ve run it a few times in the past after having hard shutdowns after power outages, kernel panics, etc. Haven’t had problems in past thank goodnesss, always a first time I guess.
In Plex Web→Settings→Manage→Troubleshooting click on the “Clean Bundles” button and wait for it to finish. Same for the “Optimize Database” button. Then restart the Plex server service, or if possible reboot.
If you go into the database backup directory folder, when is the most recent backup? Backups end with the date they were backed up (e.g. com.plexapp.plugins.library.db-2025-12-05). Also, how big are your database files?
Is the optimization & bundle cleaning something I can do while live tv is being recorded? Currently 9pm here and I think I’m recording until 1:30am. But you do say restart the server, so I’ll wait.
2025-11-23 is the date of the last .db backup. My current .db files are dated today 12/06
1121927168 Dec 6 02:30 com.plexapp.plugins.library.blobs.db
369367040 Dec 6 20:53 com.plexapp.plugins.library.db
59662336 Dec 6 21:03 tv.plex.providers.epg.cloud-a18b8a56-3337-45e0-a3fd-455cac4649c4.db
Neither seems excessively large, but the most recent backup being on 11/23 does support that butler tasks in general either aren’t running or are having an issue. The database should be backed up every three days by the butler since you say everything except “Update libraries” was checked. (There is a checkbox for “Backup database every three days”.)
I’ve never actually optimized the db while recording, so to be safe it would be good to wait. A Plex server service restart should be enough, but if you haven’t rebooted for a long time and have an opportunity then it would ensure clearing any hung/stuck processes.
I agree with your assessment about the backups. That checkbox is ticked and the past dbs are dated 23/20/17/14 of Nov.
Makes sense and seems safer to wait. I’ll go out on a limb and I am pretty sure I had a kernel panic sometime before Thanksgiving. I’ll even say sometime between 11/23 and 11/26.. Every once and a while I’ll try to play an episode from Plex web and I’ll suddenly hear all my ssh terminals “ding” because the connections from my laptop to the server dies. I’ll go downstairs and sure enough I see “server restart needed” on the monitor. So then I need a hard power cycle.
I was thinking about doing a dnf update before rebooting but I’ll hold off on that. Only need to be juggling so many cats at a time to narrow down what is going on.
Started the DB optimization around 1:45am… by 2:30am I decided I needed sleep. Woke up around 4, saw the screen was just showing “Cannot connect to Plex securely”. Went back to bed. Up at 9am, still no connection to Plex. From an ssh terminal, saw that the service was running, oddly a show transcoding from 11/27 was still running, I think a commercial detection was running from then and then some Plex Relay threads were running. I’m guessing either attempts to talk to my laptop or back to the main Plex HQ. Nothing that looked DB related. Did a graceful plex shutdown.
Once that was done, started Plex back up. Plex started fine, laptop re-connected and everything looked normal. Plex immediately started refreshing EPG. I was going to do the bundle clean but a recording started. Once this recording is done, I’ll have an hour window to do that, stop Plex and reboot. Then football will start recording.
I have EPG until 12/19 now, so happy about that. I am sort of optimistic it will work now given there were some hung processes. But it was also working fine otherwise with doing recording, playback and scanning new media, so who knows. Guess we’ll see in the next day or so.
I agree, it seems like there was a hung process. I suggested cleaning bundles and optimizing the database primarily because it seemed likely they had not been executed by the butler for a couple weeks.
Do you feel like you may have a general stability issue with your server? I run Debian, not Fedora, but I haven’t had a kernel panic for years. Any chance you are running other software and are low on memory, or perhaps a hardware problem? You could execute the command line HDSentinel or simply smartctl to see if your disks are reporting any issues. To see if your memory is having any issues you could run a memtest. Possibly overkill, but you seem to be having a lot of one off issues…
Doesn’t seem to be a stability issue. The kernel panics are rare and not a routine thing. There really isn’t much that runs on here other that Plex, Jellyfin & Dropbox. I’ve had problems in the past where it seemed like jellyfin as scanning something and lost its mind and cpu/mem went haywire and top would report huge system loads. I’ll trying doing some of those tests when things are a bit quieter on the system. Lots of recording today.
Another follow-up. Up way too early today. Noticed my EPG had not updated again. Checked the running processes and noticed Plex seemed to be stuck transcoding the same file as earlier. Figuring it must be a bad recording, shut down plex, deleted the file, and restarted. Plex updated the EPG. Not too worried about the episode, one of those PBS cooking shows that repeats a lot.
My EPG’s in Plex stopped updating a couple weeks ago. Knew it was a Plex issue as my other iptv setups stayed up to date (I’d already verified Threadfin is working as expected). After an hour of googling, came across this thread. While others mentioned all kinds of possible reasons and workarounds, Just wanted to let others know that after Cleaning Bundles, everything is again working as normal and Plex EPG’s are back.
