That’s only because the official Plex clients only request one at a time. And for devices that are actually allowed to download, it also only downloads 1 at a time. But technically, there is nothing stopping the client from requesting 20 streams at once.
That plugin is unofficial and doing things that are not suppose to happen. They are exploiting Plex’s streaming mechanism to allow downloading.
That’s splitting hairs. The site may be legit, but the ability to download/save their content is definitely not.
Sure that was an extreme analogy, but the point was regarding the idea that because you didn’t prevent it, it is ok.
I’ll bring this up with our team but as I said, that plugin in exploiting the way Plex is able to stream content so it would be difficult to stop.
The only one sorta relevant is ‘Unexpected behavior of “Download” restriction’ and that hasn’t been resolved since it’s an ongoing thing they’re working on. But at least they’re aware of it. How they handle it going forward will ultimately determine my satisfaction.
The others are all things people have gone off on tangents about and have nothing to do with the problem, but some replies have been informative just not relevant.
I think use of the word “exploit” suggests that it’s a defect or security issue, which implies that it should (or can) be fixed. I’m advocating against that interpretation.
Ok, not exploit. Taking advantage of. For example, if you open 10 Plex Web client browser tabs, you can stream from all 10 at once. These can be direct played or transcoded, but there would be 10 at once. Blocking the ability to have more than 1 at a time would prevent this use case.
An exploit is something that can be patched. That was identified right away and then we had countless people claim it’s not an exploit but a feature. Is it something that can be patched or is it something else?
I may be splitting hairs, but an example would be YouTube. Can I download from it via their site? No. Can I use a third party app to do it? Yes. Is it legal to do? That’s questionable depending on your use of it. But I’m certainly not deleting the content from YouTube when I download it. That was what was implied by your extreme analogy. There’s a human aspect of knowing right from wrong and deletion would be blatantly wrong and no sane person would argue otherwise. It’s the same as stealing something from a stranger’s house.
A more appropriate analogy would be that I gave a friend keys to my house to come and go as they pleased. They came over, took a book, duplicated it and left the book. Is that nefarious? I suppose that’s subjective. I wouldn’t be bothered by it since I gave that friend access in the first place. Should they have told me they did it? Sure. But I wouldn’t be upset if they didn’t.
I appreciate that you will bring it up with the team. That’s really all I can ask. I also realize that this can turn into a game of whack-a-mole. Where you patch the exploit, the extension creator finds a new exploit and the merry-go-round begins. That has to be up to Plex on whether resources being spent on something like that are worth it. Not my call. But you’re aware and hopefully something can eventually be implemented to adhere to the admins settings or we’re at least see the user who is doing it so admins don’t have to guess. I’m very grateful you started showing downloads in the dashboard drop down menu.
It would also seem that it might fall into the same category as limiting the amount of streams users can have at once. We do have that already and it works well. If there was an option to do the same with downloads or conversions too, that would address this. With zero being an option.
I don’t think Plex applies the stream limit to direct downloads. (I suspect because it might interact with Sync in a negative way.)
But I’m surprised to see that Internet upload speed setting is being enforced! I thought it was bypassed (or broken?) for downloads and LAN traffic, but it works well. At about 80% of tested upload speed, it leaves plenty of room for other network traffic.
I have that set to 2. But it has no effect on downloads. I suppose putting in an option like that specifically for downloads would be against what you’ve claimed is allowed, even tho the restriction option is about enabling downloads. Giving others with media servers the impression downloads are allowed.
Plex’s official downloading feature only does 1 file at a time so that setting shouldn’t affect it. I don’t know for sure how that plugin is working. Are you positive it is grabbing the files simultaneously?
Yes, I was watching it downloading 8 files at one time. They were each progressing incrementally, not one by one. That’s when my internet starting choking and I restarted my computer. The files immediately resumed upon restart. I had no idea who it was so I thought someone had maybe gotten into my account somehow so I changed my password. The downloads continued so I sent everyone an email I share my account with and one person said it was him.
Yeah. All it does is pass the streaming/playback URL to the browser. It’s literally the same URL that the web player uses for playback OR download, or the Mac app for playback or download, or even that the DLNA server uses.
I wonder if the Tautulli add-on script killstream would work for this?
Not sure if it uses a different method to determine number of concurrent streams
I don’t think so. I think Tautulli relies on client-reported playback status.
(Which folds right into the discussion about improved server status & controls/tooling. The client-reported status would ideally be used to enrich the information the server has; it shouldn’t be the only status.)
It’s funny, Plex has publicly stated in this thread they don’t allow downloads. Except there’s a downloads option for remote users in restrictions. General consensus is that streams and downloads function similarly. However, Plex claims streams can be restricted but downloads can’t. I understand this can be seen as somewhat of a semantics argument, but that would be dismissing the glaring contradictions regarding actual policy.
If downloads are not permitted, then why isn’t a restriction, like there is for streams, in place? Why is the word downloads used in restrictions if they’re not permitted?
It’s funny, Plex has publicly stated in this thread they don’t allow downloads.
I don’t see a comment from a Plex employee stating this
but that would be dismissing the glaring contradictions regarding actual policy.
Which policy are you referring to ?
Why is the word downloads used in restrictions if they’re not permitted?
Downloads are permitted:
The server admin can always download. If enabled, a shared user can use a mobile device to download the content to their device. And if using the plex app for window/mac desktop as shared user can download as well if enable by the server admin
