Plex won't recognize subtitles

General Discussions
1

I have Plex Version 1.3.3.3148.
I just moved to Linux. Non of my subtitles are show in any player I have, even the browser. Also, inside my server, there is no subtitles at all except if it is included in the movie!.
Btw, All of them were working before I moved to CentOS.

What shall I do?

2

Can you you provide me with more information?

the XML of the files as Plex sees them?

Also, do you have mkvtoolnix installed? If so, mkvmerge-gui will show what’s in the file. With that information and what Plex sees, I can start digging further.

Lastly, if need be, would you be able to carve off a piece of the file for me to examine?

3

I am no Linux expert. But the first question to ask if you can see embedded subtitles but not ‘external’ subs is this:
Do you have ‘Local Media Assets’ active under
Settings - Server - Agents - Movies - Plex Movie
and
Settings - Server - Agents - Movies - TheMovieDatabase
as well as
Settings - Server - Agents - Movies - Personal Media
?

Second standard question under Linux: does the user plex have ‘read’ access rights to the subtitle files?

4

D> @ChuckPa said:

Can you you provide me with more information?

the XML of the files as Plex sees them?

Also, do you have mkvtoolnix installed? If so, mkvmerge-gui will show what’s in the file. With that information and what Plex sees, I can start digging further.

Lastly, if need be, would you be able to carve off a piece of the file for me to examine?

How to get the XML?
Also, I did not install mkvtoolnix.
Btw, I tried to use these commands to change the default directories:

- Copy Metadata and Index Data to new location:
cp -rf '/var/lib/plexmediaserver/Library/Application Support' /home/Plex

- Move old directory to .OLD in case of issues:
mv '/var/lib/plexmediaserver/Library/Application Support' '/var/lib/plexmediaserver/Library/Application Support.OLD'

- Create symbolic link to new directory:
ln -s '/home/Plex/Application Support' '/var/lib/plexmediaserver/Library'

I don’t know if this will make the problem?

5

@OttoKerner said:
I am no Linux expert. But the first question to ask if you can see embedded subtitles but not ‘external’ subs is this:
Do you have ‘Local Media Assets’ active under
Settings - Server - Agents - Movies - Plex Movie
and
Settings - Server - Agents - Movies - TheMovieDatabase
as well as
Settings - Server - Agents - Movies - Personal Media
?

Second standard question under Linux: does the user plex have ‘read’ access rights to the subtitle files?

Yes, I do. Also, plex has the access rights.

6

User plex must have full READ access to your media. If it cannot read your media, it will not be able to see or user it. This includes reading the directories and/or the files.

To help you learn more of Linux and understand what you need to master.

I highly recommend this site… http://www.linux.com
It contains many great tutorials. This is one on fundamentals. http://linux-training.be/linuxfun.pdf

With respect to permissions. https://www.linux.com/learn/understanding-linux-file-permissions

You must remember PMS (plex) must have read permission to your media and the directories above it. It needs nothing more.

7

Btw, the problem is just with Movies_ nothing else. In TV Shows, I can see the Subtitles.
I issued this command at first:
chown -R plex:plex /home/Plex

I think plex have the Full READ Access, otherwise, nothing will show. Correct me if I am wrong.

8

Do your name match exactly?

Here is an example of Forced English subtitles (to demonstrate)

-rw-r--r-- 1 chuck chuck       3674 Jan  6 17:12 Star Trek Enterprise.S04E22.These Are the Voyages....eng.forced.srt
-rw-r--r-- 1 chuck users 6415791269 Mar 16  2016 Star Trek Enterprise.S04E22.These Are the Voyages....mkv

Also.

under: Settings - Server - Agents - Shows

Do you have Local Media Assets checked? (enabled).

9

ChuckPa,
Again thanks for your help.
My data (Moveis, TV Shoes, etc…) are in another server (FreeNAS), I just mounted the volumes in \mnt\PlexMedia
Now, I issued chown -R plex:plex /mnt/PlexMedia, then refresh movies, it worked.

Something I don’t know, is why just movies, why not TV Shows. they are using the same volume?

10

you might want to do the following. It will make life easier for you.

Please make yourself the root user when you do these. (I do not know FreeNAS so ask you to adjust username)

find /mnt/PlexMedia -type d -exec chmod 755 {} \;
find /mnt/PlexMedia -type f -exec chmod 644 {} \;

These two commands give the owner R/W permission and all others only have Read permission.

Now, if appropriate to make it easier for you to administer using your FreeNAS username,

This gives your username ownership. You no longer need to be root to control your media.
Use this command ONLY if you have a separate username on FreeNAS you use.

chown -R your_freenas_username /mnt/PlexMedia