Plex Agents Confusion

General Discussions
1

For as long as I’ve used Plex, I’ve always been confused by the unusual way Plex organizes metadata “Agents”.

Metadata Agents in other media players are simple – I have no questions there. It’s the strange combination of libraries with the 2nd level, “Primary Metadata agents”.

For example, under Movies, we have: “Personal Media” – “Plex Movie” – “TMDB”

It makes perfect sense if it were just Personal Media & Plex Movie. In that case, it indicates that the “Primary Metadata Agent” is related to the content type. In that case, all movies get processed by “Plex Movie” and all “Other Videos” get processed by “Personal Media”.

However, that is where it gets confusing. There are TWO “Primary Metadata Agents” for a single category: Movies. Okay, maybe it goes in some sort of priority order? No, that wouldn’t make sense, because if it did, the priority order listed below would be used.

In short… I’ve read the Wiki on this, but this is never explained…

(1) What is the purpose of having two separate “Primary” metadata agents, and how do they get used or prioritized (one versus the other)?

(2) Why are the “Primary Metadata Agents” (Personal Media, Plex Movie, TMDB) listed below themselves? In other words, “Plex Movie” is a header, then below it, in the prioritization order, is “Plex Movie” again. It just seems counter-intuitive?!

Thank you in advance for any light you can shed on this :smile:

2

Just want to clarify that I’m not seeking any information that is redundant of what’s already available by searching or through the wiki.

I’m not asking about how the Metadata Agents are used, but about the unusual hierarchy specific to Plex, and how to make sense of that.

Thank you!

3

https://support.plex.tv/hc/en-us/articles/201035758-Set-the-Agent-Order

https://support.plex.tv/hc/en-us/articles/200241558-Agents

4

Thank you, I had read exactly those articles prior to posting!

In response to reading those, and another Wiki on the topic, my #1/2 questions were of a more specific nature of the “Primary Metadata Agents” relative to one another.

5

So what exactly is left unclear?

Why are there Plex Movie and TheMovieDatabase?
Plex Movie is strong with ‘Cinema’ movies. It is fueled largely by the IMDb.
TheMovieDatabase lists documentaries and tv movies as well, but is user-curated.

There are several ‘contributing’ agents under each of the ‘top level’ agents.
You’ll notice that you cannot remove the ‘checkmark’ from the line which bears the name of the top-level agent. But you can change its position.
This is done so you can combine the data from several sources and determine which agent “wins”, if the same metadatum is delivered by several agents.

You can combine for instance the embedded meta data from mp4 files (which can be pretty extensive for movies) with metadata from online sources (e.g the IMDb) and augment them further with background pictures and a greater poster selection (user-made posters!) from CineMaterial.
If ‘Local Media Assets’ is above of ‘Plex Movie’, then the embedded meta data from the file itself are used preferably. If you lower the LMA agent below of Plex Movie, then they will only be used if the other sources fail to deliver.