I was expecting nfo support and the new web interface to be shown this week during pro week, but alas…
4 Likes
The concept of an NFO file is that the software reads the data from it when the media is initially added. If you modify the NFO after the fact, then you would simply do a “Refresh Metadata” for that item. NFO files also need to support already existing format like other mainstream products such as Kodi, Ember Media Manager, Tiny Media Manager. They also need to by conscious to the fact that standards to create them already exist in Sonarr, Radarr, Ember, Tiny Media Manager and most likely many more. Also keep in mind that using products like Ember allow for NFO files for home movies support adding info to nfo’s.
Yep, exactly!!! In fact, Plex already reads nfo files that you can create for Home Movies. There is zero excuse for lack of this support from the beginning THROUGHOUT the product designed for users that host their own content. No different than why Kodi exists. Instead, Plex rudely, inconsiderately and arrogantly ignored their users basic needs required for hosting your own content for over a decade, but chose to focus on attracting non media hosting users. This defies common sense when you consider how many complaints and frustrations Plex could have easily avoided if they would have supported this standard.
Not true.
I have a whole library of numerous home movies, each with their own nfo that is read by Plex. Although it doesn’t appear to support local artwork. Here’s an example.
Then you have either installed the above mentioned 3rd-party info importer agent,
or you use mp4 files which have title and description embedded as meta tags.
1 Like
Weird idea, but could I create something that takes NFO files, reads them, and inserts that data into the Plex DB directly?
I’m running into an issue I can’t fix at the moment without NFO support.
I was trying to add my Red vs Blue Blu-rays (finally, after 2 years), and noticed not all specials are on TVDB nor TMDB, and the mainline episodes are combined into a single movie file.
Sure, I can use MkvToolNix and split every chapter into separate episodes, but they don’t have an intro-outro like the web videos I downloaded 20 years ago from their website.
I found that someone appears to have added them to TVDB in that format, but they’re listed as as “Red vs. Blue Complete” which is “DVD Order” for APIs, but it’s completely locked, and none of the specials are organized into a season which also doesn’t help. Not sure what to do here without NFO support.
Plex Docs → Your Media
→ Naming & Organizing Your TV Show Files
→ Local Files for TV Show Trailers and Extras
Plex uses TMDB/TVDB ordering. I doubt you can override that by inserting info from NFO files into the database (it would probably be overwritten by a metadata refresh). Also, it seems like a lot of work for something that could be obsolete in ~75 days.
If you don’t want to split the episodes, you can use Multiple Episodes in a Single File naming.
You can always petition TVDB to add a new order for the episodes. Since it is from a Blu-ray release they might be amenable to adding it.
IIRC, TVDB does not support adding DVD/BD extras. You can add them into Featurettes, Trailers, etc. folders. See the documentation lined above (and note not all clients support all extras).
Thanks for pointing that out. What did you mean about ~75 days?
The movie-versions are in that DVD Ordering: Red vs. Blue - TheTVDB.com. Issue is all specials are unassigned, so they will never show up. I’d need 2 TV shows. One for DVD ordering and one for some other ordering if I wanna get all the specials.
The specials aren’t featurettes or trailers; they’re actual episodes. There are hundreds of them. They’re pivotal to the series, but they’re like little episodic side stories. Think of them like filler episodes or specials but hundreds of them.
Plex mentioned nfo support by the end of 2025. See my earlier reply.
1 Like
Ah, so you mean wait till the end of the year, and I can finally fix this myself? 
Then I should probably start building out my tooling to start maintaining NFO files as it looks like that’ll come in handy soon. Can’t wait!
I can finally fix all these weird issues I’ve had from series never lining up exactly with the “watch order” or issues like this where metadata doesn’t match up or is unavailable or plain wrong.
Ideally, I’d set some ID on each episode, and I could then look up metadata based on that ID, but then I can choose how to arrange the series from there.
I’m wondering if editing data in Plex could also write-back to the NFO file.
I’m hoping I can I just use the nfo post processing option that comes with filebot [DOCS] --apply post-processing features - FileBot.
1 Like
I wouldn’t hold my breath on that promise from Plex lol.
