PlexData share under 1.23x was never auto shared upon install. Migration successful from Windows

[bgarside]

I’m trying to enable or share my PlexData folder. It was never auto configured upon install. I was under the impression if you have newer than 1.19x is would do this on QTS or QTS Hero. I’m looking for guidance so I don’t corrupt my install with an old package like Create a share for Plex Library Directory
In fact when I located them using this cmd in SSH it located a share

getcfg -f /etc/config/qpkg.conf PlexMediaServer Install_path
[~] # /share/ZFS530_DATA/.qpkg/PlexMediaServer*
I cant see the folders though when I browse for them in PMS under ZFS530_DATA

My PLEX Version is 1.23.2.4600
QTS firmware version: h4.5.3.1670

There other thing that would be really nice if there was a utility that is either built in PMS or a separate app that allows the folders to be hidden as QNAP requires while allowing a full backup/restore and would put to rest many posts on this forum.

[ChuckPa]

I hopefully have some answers for you.

1. The PlexData share is not automatically created. I used to do that but it caused too many problems with all the different QTS firmware versions.

2. If you create shared folder “PlexData”, anywhere you like, you should still be able to go to the command line and cd /share/PlexData. If you can then PMS will do the rest automatically at startup.

3. You are running QuTS (ZFS) which has a completely different structure. If you cannot cd /share/PlexData after creating the shared folder then I need to "Have a conversation "

Please let me know your findings.

[bgarside]

Unfortunately I have QuTS (ZFS). I will try the method you suggested.
Much appreciated for your reply.

[ChuckPa]

Confirming for you:

[~] # ls -la /share/PlexData/
total 26
drwxrwxrwx 3 admin administrators  4 2021-05-29 18:09 ./
drwxr-xr-x 3 admin administrators  4 2021-05-29 18:08 ../
lrwxrwxrwx 1 admin administrators 64 2021-05-29 18:09 Plex Media Server -> /share/ZFS5_DATA/.qpkg/PlexMediaServer/Library/Plex Media Server/
drwxrwxrwx 2 admin administrators  3 2021-05-29 18:08 @Recently-Snapshot/
[~] # cd /share/PlexData
[/share/PlexData] # ls -la
total 26
drwxrwxrwx 3 admin administrators  4 2021-05-29 18:09 ./
drwxr-xr-x 3 admin administrators  4 2021-05-29 18:08 ../
lrwxrwxrwx 1 admin administrators 64 2021-05-29 18:09 Plex Media Server -> /share/ZFS5_DATA/.qpkg/PlexMediaServer/Library/Plex Media Server/
drwxrwxrwx 2 admin administrators  3 2021-05-29 18:08 @Recently-Snapshot/
[/share/PlexData] # cd Plex\ Media\ Server
[/share/PlexData/Plex Media Server] # ls -la
total 191
drwxr-xr-x 11 admin administrators  13 2021-05-29 18:10 ./
drwxr-xr-x  4 admin administrators   4 2021-02-15 19:39 ../
drwxr-xr-x  5 admin administrators  15 2021-05-29 18:09 Cache/
drwxr-xr-x  4 admin administrators   5 2021-05-29 18:04 Codecs/
drwxr-xr-x  9 admin administrators   9 2021-05-29 18:04 Crash Reports/
drwxr-xr-x  2 admin administrators   2 2021-05-06 02:02 Diagnostics/
drwxr-xr-x  3 admin administrators 100 2021-05-29 18:09 Logs/
drwxr-xr-x  3 admin administrators   3 2021-02-15 20:11 Media/
drwxr-xr-x  4 admin administrators   4 2021-05-01 10:22 Metadata/
-rw-r--r--  1 admin administrators   5 2021-05-29 18:09 plexmediaserver.pid
drwxr-xr-x  3 admin administrators   3 2021-02-15 19:40 Plug-ins/
drwxr-xr-x  7 admin administrators   7 2021-02-15 19:39 Plug-in Support/
-rw-rw-rw-  1 admin administrators 755 2021-05-29 18:10 Preferences.xml
[/share/PlexData/Plex Media Server] # uname -a 
Linux QNAP-TVS-H1288 4.14.24-qnap #1 SMP Sat May 15 04:00:36 CST 2021 x86_64 GNU/Linux
[/share/PlexData/Plex Media Server] # 

QuTS works just as QTS does in this regard.
(I did some recent work with the package to add QuTS support)

[bgarside]

Wow that was shockingly simple. Sorry I missed that. That PMS automatically finds the share and moves its folders over to the new Share or changes its pointers?
Does this looks correct. I allocated a Thick Share @ 115GB on my System pool of 840GB capacity. I hope thats enough for decent growth. Granted Cache takes up a ton. hmmmm. I can always allocate more. any tips?

[ChuckPa]

PMS does NOT move any data.

I create the illusion of the data being there.

The data is still stored under /share/*/.qpkg/PlexMediaServer.
QPKG requires it to be there.

I only created a link from the QPKG location to a shared folder to make your life easier.

Doing it this way means you can still use “Migrate To” and other QPKG functions without limitation.

Allocation a 1MB THIN pool is enough.

You can allocate more space if you want to put things there.

I do not do anything in PlexData but you are free to use it any way you want.

See my trick ?

[~] # cd /share/*/.qpkg/PlexMediaServer
[/share/ZFS1_DATA/.qpkg/PlexMediaServer] # ls -la
total 21796
drwxr-xr-x  6 admin administrators       23 2021-05-29 18:03 ./
drwxrwxrwx  7 admin administrators        7 2021-05-29 18:04 ../
-rwxr-xr-x  1 admin administrators   765808 2021-05-27 00:32 CrashUploader*
drwxr-xr-x  2 admin administrators        3 2021-05-27 00:54 etc/
drwxr-xr-x  4 admin administrators       61 2021-05-27 00:38 lib/
drwxr-xr-x  4 admin administrators        4 2021-02-15 19:39 Library/
-rw-r--r--  1 admin administrators   192025 2021-05-29 18:03 .list
-rwxr-xr-x  1 admin administrators   267656 2021-05-27 00:11 Plex Commercial Skipper*
-rwxr-xr-x  1 admin administrators  2697608 2021-05-27 00:30 Plex DLNA Server*
-rwxr-xr-x  1 admin administrators   113920 2021-05-27 00:11 Plex Media Fingerprinter*
-rwxr-xr-x  1 admin administrators  3946776 2021-05-27 00:33 Plex Media Scanner*
-rwxr-xr-x  1 admin administrators 15077296 2021-05-27 00:38 Plex Media Server*
-rwxr-xr-x  1 admin administrators   651272 2021-05-27 00:11 Plex Relay*
-rwxr-xr-x  1 admin administrators    11360 2021-05-27 00:11 Plex Script Host*
-rwxr-xr-x  1 admin administrators     7171 2021-05-27 00:54 plex.sh*
-rwxr-xr-x  1 admin administrators    10536 2021-05-27 00:11 Plex SQLite*
-rwxr-xr-x  1 admin administrators   302768 2021-05-27 00:11 Plex Transcoder*
-rwxr-xr-x  1 admin administrators  2640336 2021-05-27 00:11 Plex Tuner Service*
-rw-rw-r--  1 admin administrators     5254 2021-05-27 00:53 .qpkg_icon_80.gif
-rw-rw-r--  1 admin administrators     4468 2021-05-27 00:53 .qpkg_icon.gif
-rw-rw-r--  1 admin administrators     3138 2021-05-27 00:53 .qpkg_icon_gray.gif
drwxr-xr-x 10 admin administrators       51 2021-05-27 00:54 Resources/
-rwxr-xr-x  1 admin administrators      821 2021-05-29 18:03 .uninstall.sh*
[/share/ZFS1_DATA/.qpkg/PlexMediaServer] # echo /share/*/PlexData/*
/share/ZFS18_DATA/PlexData/Plex Media Server /share/ZFS18_DATA/PlexData/@Recently-Snapshot
[/share/ZFS1_DATA/.qpkg/PlexMediaServer] # cd /share/PlexData
 [/share/PlexData] # ls -la
total 26
drwxrwxrwx 3 admin administrators  4 2021-05-29 18:09 ./
drwxr-xr-x 3 admin administrators  4 2021-05-29 18:08 ../
lrwxrwxrwx 1 admin administrators 64 2021-05-29 18:09 Plex Media Server -> /share/ZFS5_DATA/.qpkg/PlexMediaServer/Library/Plex Media Server/
drwxrwxrwx 2 admin administrators  3 2021-05-29 18:08 @Recently-Snapshot/
[/share/PlexData] # 

[bgarside]

Ok, yeah so its a link makes perfect sense. Wow so I may just do that Thin with 1mb then it can expand as it needs to.
So my use case for PlexData is I’m trying to migrate my Windows Plex data into my new QNAP device and really needed an easy way to copy over my Plex data. Sounds like if I just follow this link below I should be fine?

Thank you!!

Move an Install to Another System | Plex Support

[bgarside]

Oh one question do you create a Thin or Thick Share for your Media where all the large files live? I have a few TB currently but will triple once I add my new pool and start adding content.

[ChuckPa]

Creating Thick forces the allocation of the space and you effectivelt waste what you don’t use.

Creating Thin allows you to over-provision (make it very large) but only actually use what you need AS YOU NEED IT.

Thin provisioning is a “Max Size – when I get there.”
Thick provisioning is a “Claim the space NOW”

Thick can get you in trouble very quickly because they are like quotas which you’ll always be fussing with

This is one of the drawbacks, imho, of ZFS and its provisioning / quota system.

On NAS boxes we have, IMHO, we should be able to turn it OFF.

[ChuckPa]

Regarding moving a Windows install to QNAP.

You have a LOT of obstacles to overcome:

1. The biggest is pathnames – They have nothing in common.
   a. Linux doesn’t have drive letters
   b. The directory character is slash /, not back-slash \.
   c. In Linux, \ means “take the next character as a literal and ignore any special meaning”. This isn’t the desired function.
2. Aligning the new directory structures – hopefully they align (things in the same relative structure.

I personally would stand up a new server and, in the new server, bulk-mark them as watched.

This means having two windows open side-by-side but it’ll be easy to do except for the tedium.

I find it a lot less stressful than moving to disparate operating systems.

I have some help How-To’s but they still don’t really convey the amount of work to be done.

[bgarside]

Makes complete sense. Im going with Thin, even if its not quite as fast as some say. Not worth the hassle.

[bgarside]

Yeah I hope to re-map the folders as they were. I will create them as close to how they were on Windows in ZFS. It was a flat folder structure not deep.
Never heard of marking them watched interesting trick. ‘Hows To’s’ are great I’ll take what I can get. I have custom tags I want to keep as I’m sure most people do. I dont want to re-do them but I may have to if it wont accept the Plex meta data from Windows. Thanks again

[ChuckPa]

Here is the How-To for regular desktop Linux.

For you,

1. You’ll use ZIP to make the backup instead of tar
2. QNAP can unzip that via the gui.
3. It might make sense to perform the move & unpack in the Public shared folder
4. Once unpacked, moving the contents of the “Plex Media Server” folder there into the Live system (PMS stopped of course), is instantaneous.
5. You can then go through the steps of reattaching the data to their new locations.

Back up/ Restore /clone your PMS metadata

Backing up your PMS data involves the same steps you’ll need if you were to clone your PMS and take to a new computer, reinstall the operating system, or just want a backup for safe keeping. Stop PMS Invoke the root shell Create the backup image [chuck@lizum ~.74]$ sudo sh sh-4.4# cd /var/lib/plexmediaserver sh-4.4# tar cfz /nas/tmp/PlexBackup.tar.gz ./Library sh-4.4# ls -la /nas/tmp/PlexBackup.tar.gz -rw-r--r--. 1 root root 864050144 Oct 29 15:29 /nas/tmp/PlexBackup.tar.gz sh-4.4# Copy …

[bgarside]

Hi Chuck,
I copied over the Media and Metadata almost 5gb but After I restarted PMS and rebooted the NAS it still shows the 2 original movies I added for a test. It should show several hundred. I figured it didn’t need the logs or cache. Also the strange thing is my Thin share doesn’t show much % of use like 300kb but under the sub folders files are showing.

Why so low?

[ChuckPa]

You’re using ZFS which compresses all the files

Regarding using PlexData,

You need to transfer the server as a complete unit.

Copying just the metadata will not give you the results you seek because all the linkages are in the database.

If you’re going to copy the Windows instance into PlexData, I suggest you increase it’s thin quota to 1 GB or whatever value is appropriate to match the space used on Windows

[bgarside]

Ok, I did at 15GB. Not sure what else to trigger or allow QuTS to see the data I copied over? I dont have compression on for this share. But maybe it not suppose to be in localhost? preferences I left since I figured it would mess things up. Any post on “You need to transfer the server as a complete unit.” This so strange why its behaving this way. I couldn’t find anything about this issue after searching the forums and googling.

[bgarside]

Makes me wonder If I will be able to backup the new server in the future. I made sure I signed out of both and had the services stopped per the instructions. Then signed back in and reclaimed the server and hoping I would see new libraries and content that I would need to re-link.

[ChuckPa]

You see how the data exists ?

PlexData/Plex Media Server → (the real live data)

What you copy over must be a perfect structural and naming match in all regards.

Windows is not upper/lower sensitive but Linux is.

Are you running into that?

[bgarside]

I copied ‘as is’ from windows. I just deleted the sub folders in Media & Metadata on the NAS share to see what would happen. Nothing was affected, same two titles show. So that tells me the server isnt looking at this share even though its has correct folder structure that was auto configured as designed.

Same two no matter what. Granted I can add my new Media folder and a bunch will flow in but the meta data was suppose to create the appearance of that only to be re-linked with new folders.

[ChuckPa]

Nothing would be effected because “Metadata” and “Media” don’t provide anything unless the Database (Plex Media Server / Plug-in Support / Databases is looking for them.

This is why I say you must copy the entire server instance (contents of “Plex Media Server”) as a block for it to work as you would expect