(Repost from another thread because a user told me about this one.)
Just wanted to show off what's possible to do with the rich metadata that's contained in Plex and how powerful the API is. I wanted to create a sort of status page for my Mac mini server in my apartment that also displayed the recently released movies in Plex and also nice posters and descriptions of anything that was currently being watched. This is the result of what I've created. Feel free to take the source code and make anything you'd like.
(Requires Apache webserver with PHP 5.5.4, written using Bootstrap, looks great on desktop/tablet/phone, bandwidth is total network in/out via pfSense router, and weather is from forecast.io but can only be seen when on a device inside my local network)
I would LOVE to see a report or log on who viewed what when, whether it was someone logged directly into my main myplex account or a myplex account mine is shared with. I would also like to see play count on any movie, episode, or song.
Comment on the OPs issue no. 1: I would not regard this as fully implemented. Though I am able to see people streaming video, I am unable to see them streaming music. I would like to see all activity.
Have any of you who are monitoring your bandwidth usage and shared user streams noticed a difference in transcoded stream bandwidth this past week? Most of my shared users are using Roku2XS or Roku3 players. A couple use Plex/HT. I setup each of their players to a bitrate of 4Mbps and direct stream to "Always Transcode". I've been monitoring them for months and months now and typically see an each client's bandwidth average close to what I have it set plus or minus maybe 1Mbps as a maximum. This past week I started noticing that every client now peaks my upload bandwidth to it's maximum until it grabs what I think is the complete current segment of transcoded video. After which it goes idle until the next segment is needed then repeats the cycle.
At first I thought it was the PMS update (0.9.8.10 or 11) that caused this but I've gone so far as downgrading PMS back to 0.9.8.6 which didn't resolve the issue and then even restored a vm image from several days before I performed the PMS update. This issue is still happening and is causing major buffering issues if more than one simultaneous remote user is streaming.
I've check PMS logs and I do see the bitrate limits set as they should be with Direct Play and Direct Stream both indicating 0.
Nov 02, 2013 13:29:30 [0x7f56baffd700] DEBUG - * offset => 0
Nov 02, 2013 13:29:30 [0x7f56baffd700] DEBUG - * directPlay => 0
Nov 02, 2013 13:29:30 [0x7f56baffd700] DEBUG - * directStream => 0
Nov 02, 2013 13:29:30 [0x7f56baffd700] DEBUG - * videoQuality => 100
Nov 02, 2013 13:29:30 [0x7f56baffd700] DEBUG - * videoResolution => 1280x720
Nov 02, 2013 13:29:30 [0x7f56baffd700] DEBUG - * maxVideoBitrate => 4000
Nov 02, 2013 13:29:30 [0x7f56baffd700] DEBUG - * subtitleSize => 125
Nov 02, 2013 13:29:30 [0x7f56baffd700] DEBUG - * audioBoost => 100
Nov 02, 2013 13:29:30 [0x7f56baffd700] DEBUG - * partIndex => 0
Nov 02, 2013 13:29:30 [0x7f56baffd700] DEBUG - * X-Plex-Platform => Roku
Nov 02, 2013 13:29:30 [0x7f56baffd700] VERBOSE - Completed request: GET /video/:/transcode/universal/session/1GH33H047569/base/01043.ts?protocol=hls&path=http%3A%2F%2F127.0.0.1%3A32400%2Flibrary%2Fmetadata%2F47688&session=1GH33H047569&waitForSegments=1&offset=0&directPlay=0&directStream=0&videoQuality=100&videoResolution=1280x720&maxVideoBitrate=4000&subtitleSize=125&audioBoost=100&partIndex=0: 200
Anyone else having similar results?
Update: Remote iOS clients work as expected so this appears to be a Roku and Plex/HT client issue so far.
I do, however, know the first logical question: On the Roku, which channel(s) are you using, and which version(s)?
All remote clients are using the standard Plex channel version 2.6.7. I personally ran some tests yesterday at my in-laws with both standard and Rarflix Test 2.8.1 and had the same results.
Admittedly I haven't read through this entire topic, but I'd like to offer another suggestion. On OS X, in the menu bar when you click on Plex Media Server, it shows you "One Transcoding Session active" but in order to get any more information, you need to open up a browser and pull up Plex/Web. It'd be nice if an added line was there to just show you "One transcoding session active - Aaron - Monster's University" that way I can see who is streaming what, and when. Would seem to me this would be fairly easy to implement since the code is already doing this for Plex/Web.
This. My son does NOT need to be watching The Secretary, and it's kind of a shocking deficiency, honestly. Access control by group, members by myplex IDs.
"6)Ability to set transcoding quality for remote clients on the servers side (Thanks Eric Leese)"
I just can't believe that the PMS owner (admin) has absolutely no control on the remote users' video quality.
A remote user could set his video quality high enough to do direct play and use up all my upload bandwidth and kill the Internet connection (where the PMS is hosted) and kill performance for other users (or any other service running in the LAN...) :o
We really should have in the PMS, a setting to set max quality for remote users for direct play / copy stream... The PMS admin should have full control on how it serves its service IMO.
I’d love to see this feature implemented. It’s kind of pointless showing what is being watched at the moment, I want to see the history of what was watched and by what account.
I would also like better details of who is watching or activity. If the logs could be more specific such as adding currently watched item with the user id and IP address we could use other programs to view it.
Even if something was not built in the app, better logging would allow me to use Splunk or other tools to index the logs and write my own reports.
Splunk is awesome, and the free one should be sufficient for the size of the log files.
For example on a line if we could have the user, IP and show; Splunk can report and use geoip lookup tables.
The fact you mention splunk sounds like you’d be capable of setting up plexWatch with plexWatch/Web.
I’m mobile or I’d toss some links in, but plexWatch should be in my signature… and from there you can find the front end, plexWatch/Web.
I would also like better details of who is watching or activity. If the logs could be more specific such as adding currently watched item with the user id and IP address we could use other programs to view it.
Even if something was not built in the app, better logging would allow me to use Splunk or other tools to index the logs and write my own reports.
Splunk is awesome, and the free one should be sufficient for the size of the log files.
For example on a line if we could have the user, IP and show; Splunk can report and use geoip lookup tables.
