Server Version#: 1.40.3.8555
Player Version#: 4.129.1
Not sure if this is a bug or not, however, it appears to have occurred on both of my Plex servers. I added a show that has 2 episodes per file. Normally these dual episode files would be recognized based on the required naming format that Plex uses. However, it appears to be ignoring the naming format and only recognizing the trailing episode number. Did something get broken in the most recent update? This was working properly prior to the latest update.
Naming format for each episode is: ShowName - S01E01E02 - Episode Title.ext
However Plex is only recognizing the file as episode 2 only and not even displaying episode 1 on the Plex web interface. I tried refreshing, analyzing, doing the Plex dance (removing, empty trash, clean bundles, and re-adding) and it does the same again for all 3 seasons with only showing every other episode.
I’ll state this up front, I have always used S01E01E02 or S01E01E02E03 or S01E01E03 for multi episode files that I already have on my server and it has worked every time for many years. (i have been running Plex for going on 8 or 9 years now). And as far as I can tell, they are still being seen as such. Here’s an example:
Episode 1 for both season 1 and 2 show up and work fine.
I moved all files for Recess out of the Plex folder.
Renamed all files for all 3 seasons to have the hyphen between the episode numbers.
Emptied Trash
Cleaned Bundles
Moved Recess back under the folder.
Plex re-scanned and added it again in the same way. It did it’s intro and credits detection, but only showed doing detections on the even number episodes. And still only shows the even number episodes being seen on the web interface.
I think this is something that has changed or is now broken on the server side for how it’s detecting multi-part files. Existing files appear to be ok. Not sure what will happen if the server re-scans the shows with those existing entries already in Plex.
The same occurs on both Plex servers running on different boxes.
First thing I want to mention is about the above quote from you.
While you may be using a certain naming format that works for years, if it does not follow the recommended naming convention just be aware that it can break at any point in the future if and when Plex makes changes to the scanning algorithm.
I only mention this because there have been countless threads where somebody was using a naming format that did not follow the recommendation and after an update by Plex it caused their format to stop working (because Plex became more strict in X criteria for example). Once they followed the recommended naming, everything worked as expected. Just stating an observation, nothing more.
That said, I think in your case the issue is something else and not an issue because of using the latest version. The reason I believe this is because I just did a test on my test server which is at the same version as yours.
If you have that chekced and your mp4 container has the episode metadata set to the 2nd episode in the file (not 100% sure of the fields in an mp4 file as I use MKV), that could explain why you are having the issue you are. Additionally, Plex only reads the metadata from mp4 files and not MKV files (in case you use a mix).
As you can see from my screenshots, I am using MKV with the same naming as you (minus the title info as I was too lazy to enter it but it is irrelevant from the scanner point of view). My results are what you would expect, which leads me to believe local metadata is causing your issue.
I am not familiar with editing mp4 metadata, so if you are not either, hopefully someone familiar will stop by the thread and can help out with that (or you can turn of the prefer local metadata if you do not rely on that, probably a good idea if you do not sanitize the mp4 metadata anyway).
Can confirm this just started happening to me too. I scanned my library to find only every other episode appeared. To check, I tried re-adding another show that displayed normally before. I have multiple shows with several episodes per file, all named with S02E17-E18 notation. Copying them exactly as they are to a new TV Shows library causes this effect, even though they’ve been correct in my main library for years after adding them originally.
I checked the advanced section for that Library and the Prefer Local Metadata option is not enabled. I don’t normally enable that for any of my libraries.
As well…if there is any metadata (especially in the title field) in any files I add to plex (both mp4 or mkv), I always clear/wipe it from the files prior to adding them to Plex for this specific reason to ensure that the metadata from IMDB or TVDB are used so the proper episode names or movie title is shown.
If this was a database issue, it wouldn’t be showing up in both servers at the exact same time (highly unlikely). So I am now also leaning towards it being a file issue of some type, but I am not seeing anything that would cause this with the file naming except maybe with the other hyphens in the file name? I’ll test that now.
I just renamed all of the files in the show to remove the leading hyphen between the show name and the Season/episode numbers and the hyphen after the season and episode numbers.
Same results after it re-scanned when the servers detected the changes in the folder.
Only thing I can think of suggesting now is to grab the logs and seeing if there is anything in the scanner log that indicates what might be going on. If you are comfortable you can upload them here and someone might take a look, or if someone reads this that would be willing to take a look (and knows what to look for), they could have you PM them.
I would not necessarily know what to look for, but I would be looking for the particular files/folder being scanned and then seeing if it says something in there.
One thought while typing this is to maybe try @ChuckPa’s tool, found here GitHub - ChuckPa/PlexDBRepair: Database repair utility for Plex Media Server databases, to see if maybe it is some kind of database corruption (just throwing ideas out, doesn’t really make sense but you never know). If you are comfortable trying chuck’s tool, worst case if it does not help this issue should be that you maybe help speed up your Plex instance a bit with the DB being optimized (depending on the steps you do from the tool).
Otherwise, like I said I am on the same server version and as I showed in my initial reply, naming it as you originally had named worked as expected for me.
Found a PARTIAL fix. And then I found a WEIRD occurrence.
I renamed the First/Second file to: RECESS.S01E01-E02.The.Break.In.and.The.New.Kid.mp4
(Note all the periods placed all the way through the file)
This resulted in BOTH separate servers showing episodes 2 to 26 now being detected and showing in Plex. Episode 1 was not being found (and this was the episode file I changed)
How this effects ALL episodes when only renaming the FIRST episode I have no clue.
So I then renamed ALL files in Season 1 to use the above format with periods. (It takes 5 to 10 minutes for the scan and intro/credit detections to run each time I rename a file).
And it now shows only 15 episodes but it included Episode 1 and Episode 25 but not the rest of the ODD number episodes.
Don’t know WHY this is happening all of a sudden. But it does point back to something changed in the server. Why would it suddenly change how it detects episodes based on whether the file name has periods between each word or between the title and the Season/Episode numbers or not? And why would it remove the ODD episodes from 3 to 23 when I change the rest of the file names to match the first file name?!?
I’ve used Chuck’s tool many times when needed. But I can not see 2 separate databases on 2 separate systems experiencing the EXACT same issue at the exact same time. I can try to run it, but I’m 99% sure it won’t change this as the odds of both databases on totally separate systems having the exact same issue at the same time are astronomical. The only common factor are the file names on disk and how plex is identifying the episodes based on the file names.
Didn’t even need to do the Plex Dance either time when renaming. I just renamed them and the server instantly picked up everything as shown above.
Can you do one more test, where you add S01E09-E10 as well? I was doing some testing and used episodes 1-10, double-stacked; I was able to reproduce the error. Then I noticed you only tested with episodes 1-8. When I did that, I was no longer able to reproduce.
This may suggest that the problem has to do with how many stacked episodes there are in total for some reason now.
Or if someone else would like to confirm this behavior.
I also found that when Plex got to any single episode files, it switched from Even number episodes and then when another single episode hit, it switched back to odd episodes. This is definitely something to do with the server and how it’s seeing the files.
I added 2 additional files and named them as S01E09-E10 and S01E11-E12. I refreshed the metadata after adding each one (so the files got added one at a time) and the episodes continued to add as expected and nothing happened with the previously added episodes.
I then removed the show from the Plex doing the Plex Dance and then added it back. This time it included all 6 files (12 double episodes) and I did not see the issue as described in this thread.
I do not appear to be able to reproduce this on my end.
I should add one caveat and that is that the files that I am using are dummy video files (essentially a 1 minute video of the words “Dummy Video For Testing” just so it acts like a video).
I don’t think that should be an issue (and I am not sure how other people do these test libraries where they add a whole bunch of shows, I think ChuckPA might do that for testing), but just wanted to put that out there.
Happy to do additionally testing, but not sure what the difference is between your systems and mine that seems to be causing an issue.
One other thing I just realized I should add is that my Plex setups are using Docker. My main is on CentOS 7 and my test is on Debian (not sure which version). I just noticed that OP has this under Windows and not sure what you are using @pshanew, but just figured I would mention that also.
Strange. I’m on Ubuntu 22.04 (native package) with local files. Mine are also dummies. Oh well, it must have been a red herring. I’ll probably play around with it some more to see if I can figure out what’s causing it on my system. Thanks for checking @shark2k !
Did you grab the logs after this?
I am really curious as to whether anything strange shows up in the logs to help indicate what is going on.
I just went and added the rest of season 1 on my test server, adding 1 double episode file at a time and I was not able to get the issue to appear. My test server is showing 26 episodes for season 1. At this point, it does not seem like I can reproduce the issue on my end.
Just something else to add, my production server also appears to be OK as the other day I added a double episode file for Transformers: EarthSpark for season 1 and 2 (I had missed labelling the last episode properly when I initially added it and when I added season 2 which had the last 2 episodes in 1 file, I fixed that). Both of those showed up as expected and at that time I was on the latest version for my production server as well.
I will keep an eye on the issue when adding files to my production server if I come across any double episodes files when adding episodes (unless this thread gets resolved before that).
I had episodes E01 to E12 added to the folder and all 12 episodes showing in Plex.
Adding a 7th file to S01 folder (E13E14). Only episode E14 displays. E13 shows as missing. And plex shows 13 episodes at the top of the list.
I then make a small change to the file name for E01-E02. Plex scans and 13 now displays, but 1 disappears. 2 still shows.
I make a small change to the file name for E03-E04 and now once Plex scans the show again, E01 re-appears in Plex but E03 disappears. Most likely because it was the last file updated in the database for that season so that file doesn’t get the multi-episode addition within the database.
It does appear to be a limitation or a max number of multiple episode files in a single season. Season 2 and Season 3 show up properly up to Episode 12 as well. As soon as that 13th/14th episode is added, the same issue repeats for any of the seasons.
If this is the case, a known limitation, I will probably end up having to split all of the files in half with some utility like losslesscut. Which will be a major p.i.t.a. as I will have to manually review each file one by one to determine where each episode ends and the next begins as the 2nd episode for each file doesn’t have the show intro. Only the 1st episode of the file plays the show intro, then the second episode in the file plays right after the first with the episode title splashed on screen. The next file gives the intro again at the beginning of the file but not the middle where the second episode starts. Only an episode title splash screen for the second episode in the file.
Not sure why there would be a limitation for it since odds are it uses some type of looped code for each file to be processed so the detection of multiple episodes in a file shouldn’t require any extra coding.
Ugh…I might end up telling my grand kids that I cant’ fix it. lol
I don’t believe these 2 issues are related. Scanning movies to generate thumbnails would be a separate issue from adding episodes for a TV show. I don’t even have thumbnail generations enabled on my servers.
I’m having this issue and the Plex Dance did nothing, nor did moving into a fresh library. This has never happened before, so I feel like it’s got to be something regarding a recent update, right?
FYI - I keep forgetting to mention. I don’t see anything in the plex server log. It shows the normal detection and that the file name was updated when I changed the file name and it redetected the file but drops episode 3 and leaves episode 4 as visible in Plex.
Jun 16, 2024 22:19:15.869 [17820] INFO - Library section 1 (TV Shows - Ended) will be updated because of a change in “Y:\Ended2\RECESS.(1997)\Season.1\RECESS.S01E03E04.The.Experiment.and.The.Great.Jungle.Gym.Stand.Off.mp4”
Jun 16, 2024 22:20:17.917 [16920] INFO - Notification: Scanning the “TV Shows - Ended” section -
Jun 16, 2024 22:20:18.864 [23460] INFO - Part rename detected [Y:\Ended2\RECESS.(1997)\Season.1\RECESS.S01E03-E04.The.Experiment.and.The.Great.Jungle.Gym.Stand.Off.mp4] was renamed [Y:\Ended2\RECESS.(1997)\Season.1\RECESS.S01E03E04.The.Experiment.and.The.Great.Jungle.Gym.Stand.Off.mp4]
Jun 16, 2024 22:20:18.877 [23460] INFO - Part rename detected [Y:\Ended2\RECESS.(1997)\Season.1\RECESS.S01E03E04.The.Experiment.and.The.Great.Jungle.Gym.Stand.Off.mp4] was renamed [Y:\Ended2\RECESS.(1997)\Season.1\RECESS.S01E03E04.The.Experiment.and.The.Great.Jungle.Gym.Stand.Off.mp4]
So it sees that I renamed the file. Episode 1 returned to being available because Episode 3 disappeared allowing for the max number of multi-episode files. And episode 3 was no longer visible in Plex as that was the last file actioned so it skips the entry for the multi-episode and only shows the one episode for that file (4).
No warnings or errors show. I don’t know if there is suppose to be a warning or error if you hit the max number of multi episode files in a season or not.
