I have a number of videos that are named using the standard tv format (showname - SxxExx - EpisodeTitle) but since these are not actual tv shows (I am using the personal videos type for the library) PLEX does not add the episode title from the filename… instead it only shows “Episode XX”. Is there a way to force Plex to use the episode title from the filename based on the format above?
Thanks!
This only works with m4v or mp4 files!
Step 1:
Settings - Server - Agents - TV Shows - Personal Media Shows
in there verify that the line ‘Local Media Assets’ is activated and situated at the top
Step 2:
If you add these into a tv show library which only contains such made-up series, you can switch the agent for the whole library to ‘Personal Media Shows’.
If you cannot do that, perform a Fix Incorrect Match at the show level and select ‘Auto-Match’ - ‘Personal Media Shows’ . Afterwards, refresh the whole show.
Thanks Otto, I’ll give that a try.
No luck.
Specifically I want the title in the filename used as the episode title (the words after the SxxExx - in the filename). I’m assuming that’s not possible.
Thinking I might have to live with it not working (unless there’s a way) or find a tool to add that name as metadata to the video?
Another question, what methods/processes does Plex us to determine the proper title of an episode?
Thanks again.
@santiagodraco said:
Specifically I want the title in the filename used as the episode title (the words after the SxxExx - in the filename). I’m assuming that’s not possible.
Precisely. I Plex cannot take the episode name from the file name, only from embedded title tags.
There is actually an extended Personal Video scanner and agent which is able to do that and more.
But it might break down at any time (since it is written by a 3rd party) and you can only use it in a separate library.
Thinking I might have to live with it not working (unless there’s a way) or find a tool to add that name as metadata to the video?
If your files are mp4 (or can easily be converted to mp4) then you can use the embedded meta tag method.
For Windows you can use mp3tag to set the ‘Title’.
Another question, what methods/processes does Plex us to determine the proper title of an episode?
Plex can only determine a title if the title is either:
Another method would be to generate Kodi-copatible .nfo files and use the .nfo importer agents to read them into the Plex database.
That’s the info I needed. Thanks for the help!
Plex needs to get with the times and update their program to be able to do this super simple task of taking episode names from filenames. I just bought a 52 DVD history set, and of course it’s not on thetvdb.com because it was never aired as a complete series, even though individual episodes were aired on History Channel and Discovery Channel. But since thetvdb.com gets all bent out of shape if you were to add a DVD series to their database (and deletes your hard work), that’s a losing battle. So I don’t know why Plex is so stuck on the tbdb database for all series, regardless of whether they are tv-based or not. Furthermore, I dont know why Plex can’t distinguish between two distinct series of the same name that are in the same library, like “Ancient Civilizations”, even when you rename one to “Ancient Civilizations DVD set” or “Ancient Civilizations (2009)”, it still can’t distinguish the two (because only one appears in thetvdb.com). So what happens is the second series briefly shows up in the Plex library and then completely disappears, so there is no chance for you to correct the metadata, or unmatch, or fix incorrect match. So I had to name it something ridiculous like “Boogie Woogie” just to get it to show up in Plex. This is so dumb. I really hate the way information services are linked into Plex, how you have to choose one and only one service per library. Why can’t I go into the settings for a particular series, and set it to “ignore thetvdb.com for this series, and just take the episode names from the file name”? No, Plex and its idiotic user-unfriendly rules make me manually type in all 52 episode names, even though I have named the file names per the Plex naming conventions, such as: “Ancient Civilizations DVD Set - s01e06 - The Romans Were Smarter than Plex Is”. And then if I ever rearrange my file structure, I’ll lose all the work I typed into Plex. Seriously, give us a check box to “take episode names from file names” for a particular episode, and stop making us live in the 1990’s.
