BACKGROUND:
When you connect to the server via the Web interface, go to Settings, then to Devices. You will see a panel on the left listing the various platforms, and the right panel contains a list of devices for the selected platform, sorted by last connection date. Many of the devices (Android, in particular) have a common name (AFTT, My AFTM, etc). You cannot change any of the details of each device; HOWEVER, this is a very useful feature.
SCENARIO:
You are sitting on the couch with your tablet. You prefer using the tablet interface because the remote control is too cumbersome/slow. The Plex app allows you to quickly search for actors, movies, etc; in short, It runs circles around the TV interface. Once you find a movie to watch, you press the âChoose a Playerâ charm in the upper right hand corner of the Plex app UI. You see a list of devices, each named appropriately so that you can effectively cast the playback command to that device. You choose one, and playback begins on that device.
OBSTACLE:
As mentioned above, the Plex Server UI doesnât allow you to name connected devices but, clearly, it could keep a mapping between the actual device identity and a user-supplied identity. The default would be the actual device identity.
SUGGESTION:
Add simple UI changes to the Web interface which allow a user to change the name of the device.
Please consider this feature seriously. It provides a ton more flexibility to users at a relatively low cost. I would use this feature continuously. As it stands, I have to guess which device Iâm sending commands to; which is a bit frustrating/unnecessary, given that you have all the pieces in place to make this work.
Thank you for your consideration. Iâm a lifetime Plex subscriber.
FireTVs are extremely popular devices. I have 4 in my house, along with Windows, iOS, and other devices. Seems like a relatively minor feature ask, given that you largely already have most of the functionality.
Ich agree.
Ich always have to guess which of my three ATV2 devices needs an update, not to speak of changing player for voice control.
Just make that editable, bind it to the deviceâs MAC address, for example.
Does the AFTV or AndroidTV layout not have an option in the settings under general for âDevice Nameâ? I no longer have any android boxes, only phones/tablets so I cannot check. But in the âMobile Layoutâ I can change the device name with that setting and it reflects through PMS.
Amazon being amazon, if youâre seeing AFTx without a long string of numbers, the plex app my be pulling the device name from the FireOS services (or plex is seeing itâs an AFTV and just assigning it). If it is from Amazon, you can change that name of your device through the amazon devices page. Just click âYour Devicesâ, the button under actions next to the desired device, and the edit link after itâs name. You may have to restart the app, and may even have to clear app data/reinstall it on your aftv depending on when the app picks up the device name to pick up the change.
Beyond that, this really should be a client side fix either way. Thatâs how the current device naming system works from every other client type.
No. You canât change the device name on the Fire TV Stick under Settings | Device | About. You can go to the Amazon devices page to change the device name â and the change does register on the Fire TV Stick, itself â however, Plex does not see the device name change. It shows it as âAFTTâ even after a client and server app restart. So, really, there is no way to fix this on the device or on Amazon.com. The fix must come from Plex server.
Um, no. Did you read my post above? I changed the Amazon device name. The Fire TV Stick Settings | Device | About shows the changed name. Itâs just not being picked up by the Plex client app running on the Fire TV Stick. Every Fire TV Stick shows up in Plex as âAFTTâ. Which is a broken experience.
I understand Plex is not obligated to fix this. Thatâs why the title of this discussion is â[Feature Request]âŠâ â not feature demand. If you donât want to fix it, fine. But you canât lay this on Amazon.
Amazon has no reason to address this issue. It only affects Plex users. Further, it happens on other platforms (Xbox, etc). Iâm not going to chase down every platform vendor to try and get each of them to fix an issue that is clearly within Plexâs ability to fix. Plex has a MAC address for each device. They know the platform. All they need is a user-defined string which describes it. If it isnât a priority to consider modest requests from this Lifetime Customer, so be it. But I certainly canât (and wonât) recommend Plex to others. Device naming and casting is a fundamental component in any serious entertainent system.
@trumpy81 said:
Plex is not obligated to fix issues with any device that Plex has not manufactured.
This is clearly an issue with your Amazon device, and you should take that up with Amazon, not with Plex.
Wait a second⊠you are not⊠what? obligated???
You have a sense of humor that is not mine.
You want to tell me that you will never be able to send Amazon Echo commands via Plex skill to different Plex apps on different Amazon FireTV, since you are not obligated to have a configuration on your Server which would allow that?
Easy Thing: In your device tab, just add an additional, user-editable text box for ANY of your players that can be referenced via voice command to the Plex skill and PMS will know which device/plex app to look for. This is no nuclear fusion technology. Of course, you are not obligated to do anything⊠but you loose functionality without doing so.
The same with Server names⊠Why should I change my PMS Server Name if I want to change Plex voice command reference for it. These are different things. Think twice, please. Thank you.
From time to time, I am asking myself if these FORMAL REASONS are a way to block requests because you guys have too much work to do and can help organize your work load by finding reasons of not acting on situations like these.
Please put it on your To-Do list. Reality is, users have more than one Amazon FireTVs, and they cannot use the Echo Plex skill normally. It would be so easy to add functionality hereâŠ
@trumpy81 said:
Have you ever considered that Amazon are changing the name on the Fire TV, but that change is not changing the network name? That is where the issue is, it is not registering on the network, therefore Plex cannot pick up the change.
Then do not try to pick it up from These devices, but let the user name it if he wants to. PMS does not differentiate player devices by device host names. So you do not Need that ânameâ at all.
@thomasolsen@outlook.com said:
Um, no. Did you read my post above? I changed the Amazon device name. The Fire TV Stick Settings | Device | About shows the changed name. Itâs just not being picked up by the Plex client app running on the Fire TV Stick. Every Fire TV Stick shows up in Plex as âAFTTâ. Which is a broken experience.
I understand Plex is not obligated to fix this. Thatâs why the title of this discussion is â[Feature Request]âŠâ â not feature demand. If you donât want to fix it, fine. But you canât lay this on Amazon.
Plex is aware of the issue with not being able to rename the Fire TV devices. Currently, itâs a limitation of all our big screen apps using that interface (Fire TV, smart TVs, game consoles). We hope to be able to address this in the future.
On the Fire TV devices, Amazon does allow you to rename the device at the device level. However, they havenât exposed a way for apps, like Plex, to read that name.
I would like to bump/add to this request. I donât even care about the fireTV issue (i have only one) , but it is kind of hard to figure out which of the 6 different âplex web (chrome)â pcâs is which
That would be really nice to rename
I really agree with this feature. Im supprised this hasnt been implemented already, the current layout does absolutely nothing to identify individual devices. I have no idea if the devices listed are all in my home, which is which, whether another device im not familiar with has been connected or not.
I mean why even bother listing devices if you cant identify them? It doesnât even tell you who used the device lastâŠ
Changing the devices network name isnt a viable solution, not all devices allow you to name them, and its a huge hassle to have to get all your users to name their devices: both figuring out how for every device, and motivating them to put the work in when it makes zero difference to themâŠ
Can someone tell me a use case for the current device list? I cant think of any
Edit: I tried the option within the plex android app to set a device name btw, nothing changed at all, the device is still listed as ânexus 5xâ both on the servers devices list as well as the device selection on the app
(view content from: âservernameâ or ânexus 5xâ)
+for this feature request. I have 3 sony android tvs, all with different names that are picked up correctly everywhere on the network (youtube cast, chrome cast etc etc) but plex picks them up as âBRAVIA 4K GBâ. I canât see whatâs streaming where or cast to a specific device coz theres only 1 common name in the list.
