There’s also a more detailed guide from chuckpa in the Linux tips & tricks section with specific specialties/considerations and how to migrate from another platform to Linux (though it’ll also be useful for Linux → Linux migrations).
Personally I consider your biggest obstacle will be the massive version jump.
While PMS can skip quite a number of versions and upgrade your library and databases accordingly… version 1.10 is just… really old. So not sure this might be a problem (e.g. too many significant changes to the folder/library structures).
Keep in mind your old setup was released in Dec. 2017 – that’s ancient when it comes to computer stuff
the first question is why did my old server go missing?
i can’t go there
second question - database migration
as I understand, to start the migration, the server must be visible
in general, I am extremely dissatisfied with the need to update the server:
I configured the hardware, configured the software
connected to TV and other devices
everything is working. everything suits me. this is my server. this is my home. all ok!
then the developers come and break everything! I need a new server, although nothing has changed for me! the video is the same, the TV is the same
why change something with such a wrecking method ?
There’s a number of possible causes.
Did you by chance reset your Plex account password and opted to sign-out all devices? This will also sign-out the server and you have to re-claim it.
Can you still access your old server using the machine’s local IP address (e.g. http://[IP address]:32400/web)?
Not really… all you need is access to the server’s data (=file system access or some backup)
Not sure what was broken for you.
The current-generation Plex clients have required a PMS w/ version 1.18.3 for quite some time (years). It’s pretty common that developers cannot endlessly maintain compatibility with ancient releases when releasing new versions of apps. If you didn’t touch that server for 4 years and it was working fine, that’s a pretty long time.
The concept of “freezing” a setup the way you like it doesn’t age well in IT. Things change… be that some background changes on your server machine, changes in your home network or external factors you cannot influence (e.g. expiration of certificates…). Don’t get me wrong… I know some people who’ve been clinging to their Windows XP setup for ages, that’s the same people still on Windows 7 despite the platform no longer being supported. I’m not saying there no charm to vintage car… though that leaves you disconnected from technical/security advances and requires finding your personal solutions to compensate for the world turning on.
Happy 2022.
Sorry I cannot read that.
Is that the web app from the new or old server? The UI looks quite different from what I get with the current server installed.
As for migrating your database… see above
As for the server not starting up… does the new PMS write any logs before it’s not starting? Any error messages on the Linux shell when the startup fails?
yesterday after the start of the service there was only one process
but today everything works
thank you for your help
I think two implicit points need to be added to the documentation:
1.explicit change of the group user to plex / plex - not everyone will guess
2.that the conversion can take a long time
It’s well documented that Linux uses plex:plex as the default.
Upgrading a PMS 1.10.x → 1.25.2 is a miracle. Such a monstrous upgrade of the database … (the horrendously long list of schema changes) would be staggering…
All the metadata will definitely need to be refreshed to fill in all the holes which now exist (fields which didn’t exist in 1.10.x)
After copying, they may have different from PLEX / PLEX groups / owners
For example, you can change so
find . -name “*” -exec chown plex:plex {} ;
Successful migration means that the code is written correctly and exceptions are processed correctly. This is actually a rarity in modern programming. My respect programmers.
Yes, I updated the database, and the process of updating the metadata still goes - a lot of files.
You don’t need to run find, matching every name with * and executing a chown on each file and directory.
Instead, you can execute a simple sudo chown -R plex:plex . which starts with the current directory and gets everything. Be careful you’re in the right place – e.g
cd /var/lib/plexmediaserver
sudo chown -R plex:plex .
Now you know everything from here down is owned by plex:plex.
(doing this from / would blow up the OS )
)