New Plex Media Server movie scanner and agent preview

Plex Media Server Metadata & Adding Files
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What is it and what’s new?

We’re working on some upgrades to our movie metadata infrastructure, and we’d like to give you a peek at what’s in store. The major changes are a brand new scanner and agent, rebuilt from the ground up to be lean and super speedy, and a cloud-based metadata service that does all the heavy lifting to bring together multiple metadata sources such as IMDb, TheMovieDb, Rotten Tomatoes, and more to provide you with the best metadata in one place. We’d like to invite you to check it out, and let us know how it’s working for you.

What to Test?

  1. Download the preview PMS version 1.19.6.3033 (links below)

  2. Use the custom bundled web app. (This now shows a preview of movies in fix match)

  3. Create a new test Movie library using the “Plex Movie” Scanner and “Plex Movie (Preview)” Agent.
    image
    Note: We don’t yet allow upgrading your existing library

    Tip: You can create a new movie library that points to the same folders as your existing library. Which may make it easier to compare.

  4. Once movies have scanned into the library please check that your movies matched correctly;

    Please also check that the following work;

    • Local assets such as poster and fanart.
    • Local sidecar subtitles are detected.
    • Local extras such as trailers
    • Localized posters library option

WARNING: These libraries should be used for testing purposes only. As we will be improving this feature along the way, there is no guarantee of future/backward compatibility etc`.

What are some of the things still being worked on or known issues?

  • Allowing existing movie libraries to be upgraded to the new agent/scanner
  • Improving performance when scanning large single folders (Movies not in separate folders)

How to report issues?

If you come across something that we matched incorrectly, please use the “Fix Match” option in the dropdown which will help improve let us know what the correct match for that item is.

Screen Shot 2020-05-27 at 7.50.08 AM
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NOTE: For this forum preview, using “fix match” will anonymously send the old and new match data to our metadata provider for debugging so we can improve future matching.

What if my movie matched but has bad metadata?

This should be rare but if it happens please reply to this thread and let us know in detail what is wrong with the metadata eg; the poster is in the wrong language, the synopsis is missing etc.

What if my movie didn’t match at all?

This should also be rare if your filenames follow our naming guide, but if it does happen please reply to this thread with what the movie should have matched to and the full filename.

Download Links (Updated: 2020-07-03)

Note: If you have created libraries with the new agent in preview version 1.19.5 please remove those when testing with version 1.19.6.

Version: 1.19.6.3033-dd09abed3 [experimental preview]

Computer

NAS

Docker

To test in a Docker container (such as Unraid);

  1. Open a shell in the container (using docker exec or Open Console on Unraid )
  2. Download the Ubuntu package for your architecture using curl.
    curl -o /tmp/pms.deb <URL>
  3. Install the package.
    dpkg -i /tmp/pms.deb
  4. Remove the deb now that it is installed.
    rm /tmp/pms.deb
  5. Update the version number in /version.txt to reflect the build number you’re testing.
    echo 1.19.6.3033-dd09abed3 > /version.txt
  6. Restart the container.
9 Likes
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Hello,

I created a test movie library on my Windows server and one of the movies I have is not matching properly.

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Highlander is supposed to be The Dark Knight.

image

I did Fix Match as directed and even with TMDb won’t fix it.

image

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Would love to try it out but when I try to install it on my local PC I get the "another install is going on " message even thought one isn’t.

Plex Media Server_20200526185324.log (21.5 KB)

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Please try restarting your machine and then uninstall and install this build. Your AppData and preferences will remain intact during the reinstall of PMS.

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Thanks for this report. I have passed this on to the team. If you add the year to the filename (as per our naming guide) does it match?

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I’m installing this on a different machine and aiming it at my existing media. I also managed to fix it by deleting what was in the temp folder and rebooting. Thanks.

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Adding the year did fix it.

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image975×513 201 KB

Extras and trailer also loaded fine.

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these links do not appear to be working;

  "errors" : [ {
    "status" : 404,
    "message" : "File not found."
  } ]
}

windows/mac/freebsd downloaded.

did not try any nas links.

fixed, thanks!

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Ohh Sorry, fixed now (I had a typo in part of the URL)

2 Likes
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This might not be widely known, but up until now, Plex has always been able to read an IMDB link inside an NFO file. That’s how I’ve never had a mismatch, even though my naming convention does not follow Plex’s recommended whatsoever. My question is, will these NFO files still work? Thanks, and keep up the great work!

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Will these NFO files still work?

Yes I have just looked at the new native scanner code and support for parsing the IMDb GUID out of the NFO file is supported.

1 Like
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I have noticed an Error with a Movie: Desperado 1995

Artwork, there a blank as the default poster but all artwork is available via Edit.

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Thanks for that! OK, one more question, while I’m at it: Up there it says “cloud-based metadata service that does all the heavy lifting”. Could you go into a little more detail on this? Will this eliminate the need for storing millions of files in our Plex data folder? That’s always been a concern for me, as my data folder is close to 100GB, without me using thumbnails, previews, etc. at all.

1 Like
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How do I do this for unraid?

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Ahh good question. Let me add some instructions to the download area for Docker.

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Just another question - will this be available for the NVIDIA Shield?

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Please point me to the url when finished.

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Docker info has been added to the end of the original post.

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Interesting development from a Test Library. If your add a incorrect Library type among-st others it will stop scanning in that order till you remove the incorrect entry. Scanner will commence again and complete. No error message.

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Interesting development from a Test Library. If your add an incorrect Library type among-st others it will stop scanning in that order till you remove the incorrect entry. The scanner will commence again and complete. No error message.

Do you mind elaborating a bit more on this? Did you add a TV folder to the Movies library?