First I really like Plex Server and I’m still learning the in’s and outs. I have noticed the Sort Tag lock does not always work on some files. After saving the edited changes and reopening the edit GUI the lock is in place, but when I perform an for example just a Movie Update Libraries some of files just loose all their edited updates I just added. My video files all have enbedded metadata that I do myself, some times I do change the poster from the original and mostly change the sort tags. Yet some edits will not remember there settings or there just becoming unlocked somehow. This is why I think a Master Edit lock added to the edit GUI would be useful to lockout any changes the Plex Server would make trying to updated tags. Maybe I’m missing something, since I don’t really know how the edited tags are house kept. Please consider this process improvement for your next release.
Embedded metadata in Video Files, if not fully compliant - along with the file name and folder structure (TV Shows mainly) - will be a source of constant irritation. If you’re using MP4 files, forget about it.
If Plex is unable to match a file due to really odd (or downright crappy naming and structuring) you’ll not have much luck keeping edits in tact. Properly named and properly matched items don’t suffer from this illness.
Generally speaking the best possible metadata to put in a video file is NONE. Name your files according to the guidelines, Plex will match according to your file names and all will be well:
https://support.plex.tv/hc/en-us/categories/200028098-Media-Preparation
https://support.plex.tv/hc/en-us/articles/200381023-Naming-Movie-files
https://support.plex.tv/hc/en-us/articles/200220687-Naming-Series-Season-Based-TV-Shows
Errant Metadata inside MP4/M4V files is public enemy #2 (crappy naming and structuring takes the top slot) when it comes to odd behavior. Move Local Media Assets to the bottom of every available Agent list in Shows and Movies, but do leave it enabled. It’s necessary for some things: Sub Titles, Local Artwork, etc. This will save you a lot of unnecessary pain and suffering if you use MP4 files, or want to at some point:
Plexweb/Settings/Server/Agents/
Drag LMA to the bottom of the lists and drop it.
Thank for you input but the metadata is not the issue it’s the lock on the edit tags, which I believe to be controlled via the Plex server. The lock in the edit GUI should remain locked and for some reason it’s not. All my files conform to Plex naming conventions.
Items losing their manually added metadata is mostly caused by them not being ‘matched’, which in turn is most likely caused by them not being named correctly. (There are some other reasons why this can happen, but bad file names is the most frequent cause.)
Please post the Plex XML info of an affected item.
Thank you for your response OttoKener. I wasn’t aware of the XML file info. Your answer sounded interesting. Just to give you a little system Back ground. My Plex server is running on dedicated Mac mini OS X 10.12.5. The Movie library is on a NAS Drobo5N drive. There are currently over 700 movies all H264 format. All the files have Metadata info that I include using the app Identify. The Plex server has been reading the Metadata without issue. Out of the 700+ movie files there seems to be less than 50 files that l issues with.
There are several different issues at work here. I have been using the Edit Sort Title Tag to keep for instance all my James Bond movies in Chronological order using the Sort Title name “James Bond 01” etc. Out of the 26 movies James Bond movies 12 of them are loosing the Locked Sort Title info and reverting back to the name. I also have been locking the Title on the problem files as well. The two attaches XML files are “Dr No” which fails to hold the the sort tag info and “From Russia with Love” which holds the sort tag info. Just to interject here, this morning when I opened Plex this morning and the “Dr No” had the Sort Title and Title Tag unlocked. Both were locked yesterday after Plex did a Movie Update Library and the files did not retain the Edited Sort Tag information. I hope you see something in the XML file that can resolve my issues. The other issue is the Poster changes also with an Update from the Edited menu. I didn’t see anyway of locking this poster info in the Edit GUI.
Thanks for your help.
Next time simply save the media info as XML files.
Both files are properly ‘matched’.
There is a second possibility which may cause items to lose manual edits:
When your file storage is not reliable enough.
see https://forums.plex.tv/discussion/comment/1440761/#Comment_1440761
Thanks for your input OttoKerner. I did verify Settings - Server - Library - ‘Empty trash automatically after every scan’ . It was on and is now off. On your Statement of the NAS not being fast enough confuses me. How fast is enough? The Drobo Network status indicates it’s running at 1 GHz Full Port Duplex on ethernet. I also have sufficient capacity unused space. My network traffic is light. Could this be a Browser issue?
What would be the prefered Plex > Server > Network settings?
@gespensen said:
On your Statement of the NAS not being fast enough confuses me. How fast is enough?
That’s not what I meant. When a NAS is spinning down its drives to save power, it may take too long to spin them back up when an access is made by Plex.
What would be the prefered Plex > Server > Network settings?
I’d disable support for IPv6 but leave everything else on defaults - unless a concrete issue requires a change there.
Thank you for your answers. They helped me understand a little more about Plex Server working.
