Pre-roll doesn't play (but trailers do)

[malesca]

Server Version#: Plex Media Server 1.32.7.7621-871adbd44
Player Version#: Plex HTPC 1.53.0

Server and player on the same Mac Mini M1 running macOS 14.0 Sonoma.

When I play a movie, it plays a trailer and then the movie – not the pre-roll video I specified. Seeing the same behaviour in the web player.

How do I fix it? I don’t actually want the trailers, just the pre-roll, but I figured I’d leave trailers on until I get the pre-roll working, to rule that out as a reason for the pre-roll not to show.

I’ve followed the official instructions as far as I can tell.

Plex Media Server:

• In the “Extras” settings, I have
  • Set “Choose Cinema Trailers from: Only unwatched movies”
  • Checked “Include Cinema Trailers from movies in my library”
  • Not checked the other “Include Cinema Trailers from …” options (I don’t have Plex Pass)
  • Set “Movie pre-roll video” to: /Volumes/Dodongo/gevalia_amalia.mp4
    • If I type open /Volumes/Dodongo/gevalia_amalia.mp4 in a terminal, the video opens in QuickTime Player, so the path is definitely correct, assuming it’s meant to be a Unix path.
    • That video is https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XO8huG07Fc0 downloaded via the Downie app.
• On the “Movies” library
  • Under “Advanced”, I’ve checked “Enable Cinema Trailers”

Plex HTPC:

• In the “Player Experience” settings, I’ve set “Cinema Trailers: Play 1 before film”

So are there any other settings I need to set?

What’s a good way of debugging this?

[malesca]

I had been sloppy and ended up with a trailing space after the path. After removing it, it works.

Fair enough – the docs even say

Note : When specifying multiple videos, do not insert spaces after (or before) the separator character.

Even so, it feels a bit unforgiving for Plex not to automatically strip whitespace in this situation. Or showing a clear error message.