# Multi-series episode matching BUG

**URL:** <https://forums.plex.tv/t/multi-series-episode-matching-bug/856018>\
**Category:** Plex Media Server\
**Tags:** server-linux\
**Created:** [October 7, 2023, 9:56pm UTC](https://forums.plex.tv/t/multi-series-episode-matching-bug/856018 "2023-10-07T21:56:24Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Showing post:** 23

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![pshanew](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/plex/user_avatar/forums.plex.tv/pshanew/32/160555_2.png) [@pshanew](https://forums.plex.tv/u/pshanew)\
**Post date:** [February 10, 2024, 12:01am UTC](https://forums.plex.tv/t/multi-series-episode-matching-bug/856018/23 "2024-02-10T00:01:37Z")

</div>

Hmm… I just did a test with these files/folder hierarchy:

```auto
/home/myuser/test_tv/
├── MGM Cartoons (1934)
│ └── Season 1934
│ └── MGM Cartoons (1934) - S1940E02.mkv
└── Tom and Jerry (1940)
    └── Season 1940
        └── Tom and Jerry (1940) - S1940E01.mkv

```

The Tom and Jerry episode is a hard link to the MGM Cartoons episode. Pointing my test library to “test\_tv” resulted in the behavior we observed earlier: When a scan is performed it finds one or the other series, but not both. Refreshing metadata causes the detection to flip to the other series.

To test the CIFS/SMB3 mount, I created a share on my system; in /etc/samba/smb.conf:

```auto
[tempcifs]
        path = /home/myuser/test_tv
        guest account =
        writeable = yes
        valid users = myuser
        user = myuser

```

Restarted smbd and nmbd:  
`sudo systemctl restart smbd nmdb`

And then, still on the same system, mounted that share via the loopback interface on a temp directory:  
`sudo mount -t smb3 -o username=myuser //127.0.0.1/tempcifs /mnt/cifstest/`

(/mnt/cifstest/ is owned by `myuser`.)

This is /mnt/cifstest/ after mounting:

```auto
/mnt/cifstest/
├── MGM Cartoons (1934)
│ └── Season 1934
│ └── MGM Cartoons (1934) - S1940E02.mkv
└── Tom and Jerry (1940)
    └── Season 1940
        └── Tom and Jerry (1940) - S1940E01.mkv

```

I removed my existing test\_tv directory from the library configuration and added /mnt/cifstest. (Actually, I performed a [Plex Dance](https://forums.plex.tv/t/the-plex-dance/197064) to ensure there were no remnants of the previous configuration.) A scan was performed and it then matched both series separately, with correct metadata.

Some notes:

- I already had samba installed and configured on my server; the configuration I added above was in addition to the existing one.
- I tend to use CIFS and SMB(3) interchangeably. However, in this test, I’m mounting via SMB3. Just ignore that I named everything with cifs.
- This testing was done with a dummy file generated from `dd`:  
`dd if=/dev/random of="MGM Cartoons (1934) - S1940E02.mkv" bs=1M count=10`  
Then I created the hard link to it.
- I did some testing with bindfs as well but saw some weird results. I need to do those tests again.
- Other stuff I likely forgot.

All that to say it appears that looping back via a local network share might workaround this problem for you. If I were going to take this approach, I’d only do it for my problematic series. That is, put those series in a separate folder hierarchy and then only share that.

---

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