When I’m making a smart playlist. I have the option to sort episodes by all kinds of things, but the one of the two really useful sorting options isn’t available.
Sorting by episode number would let us create a “round robin” styled playlist that plays one episode of each show on the list before starting over.
Yes, yes, YES!!!
I cannot believe this is not a feature. I have found that SO MANY people want some sort of TV channel style smart playlist feature, so they can add a bunch of shows and watch all of the first episodes, then all of the second episodes, then all the 3rd episodes, etc., like if they were watching a program block on a network.
This simple addition of an episode number sort column would probably solve this issue!
I am wondering if the episode number would be the overall number or the number within the season. If the latter, then we would also need a season number sort column. Does Plex already have the ability to sort by 2 or more columns (air date, then episode name)? If not, we would also need that ability added.
I can’t believe this feature had zero votes!
I would like to add to this to try to clarify so that maybe folks see the value. This would replace any “Fake TV” feature I could want:
Lets say I have two shows:
The simplest sorting would be episode order:
Show 1 S01 E01
Show 2 S01 E01
Show 1 S01 E02
Show 2 S01 E02
Show 1 S02 E01
Show 2 S01 E03
Show 1 S02 E02
Show 2 S02 E01
Show 2 S02 E02
Show 2 S02 E03
Show 2 S03 E01
Show 2 S03 E02
Show 2 S03 E03
A more interesting (to me) sorting would be automatically restart shows once they are completed:
Show 1 S01 E01
Show 2 S01 E01
Show 1 S01 E02
Show 2 S01 E02
Show 1 S02 E01
Show 2 S01 E03
Show 1 S02 E02
Show 2 S02 E01
Show 1 S01 E01
Show 2 S02 E02
Show 1 S01 E02
Show 2 S02 E03
Show 1 S02 E01
Show 2 S03 E01
Show 1 S02 E02
Show 2 S03 E02
Show 1 S01 E01
Show 2 S03 E03
Show 1 S01 E01
… etc …
The high level sorting goal as I see it would be “watch the next episode from an user ordered list of TV shows”
Yeah, sorting by the absolute episode number, and not just number within the season.
This would be really useful now that I’m watching multiple advent calendar shows.
If I could also sort by episode number, it would be possible. I also like the suggestion for absolute numbering or some sort of chronological alternation so that shows with different season lengths would be properly alternated.
This is a great Idea. Upvoted for sure.
To build off of it, if we can sort by episode number, then we should be able to filter by it as well. Perhaps even access to all the different filter options as sorting options to give us more capabilities with already configured elements.
If we could sort by episode number, we should be able to sort by season number as well. These 2 filters should go hand-in-hand for usability. Otherwise, episode numbers may be pulled from all seasons in a given TV show. Just a thought for functionality.
I had this idea today and was going to suggest it but you beat me to it…by a loooong time.
There is another thread that suggests an “on deck” shuffle feature but being able to sort an episodic playlist by S/E would essentially achieve the same function and seems like it’d be a much easier feature to code into the system.
The only drawback to this – and it’s a minor drawback, for sure – is that shows with short seasons (Office S1) would have a long gap between playing S1 and S2 if it’s in a playlist with a bunch of shows that have 21 episode first seasons. In that case, the “shuffle on-deck” would be the logical feature but in the meantime, if Plex could throw us a “Sort by S/E” option, I’d be a very happy plexer. Plexist. Plexicon. Plex user.
This is a great idea that I’m shocked hasn’t been added yet. Maybe a scheduled task to “analyze episode count” so that every episode could be assigned a simple 0001, 0002, number for overall counts. This would give TV based playlists an incredible functionality.
