Manual Collection Set Up Not Completing / Sticking

[greenawayj]

Hi all.

I am a new convert to Jellyfin after being on Plex a LONG time.

I have set up Jellyfin on Unraid with my Movie, Shows, and ripped Music collections last Friday.

Jellyfin 10.10.7
Unraid 7.1.4
Accessing locally at :x.x.x.x:8096 and remotely through NGINX via my own domain and duckdns for IP relay (Issue is not access related.  Just conveying access works locally and remotely and I have some reasonable degree of technical skills though I'm not a linux / docker expert by any means.)

Set up was essentially smooth with the only issue being a handful of bad matches for some movies.   I am able to set up Playlists just fine and noted that the Playlist folder and list_abc.xml file were created under my appdata/jellyfin/data/ folder when I set up my first playlist.   

The issue I am having is Jellyfin will not allow me to fully set up any (manual or otherwise) Collections in the Movies library. 

I am able to complete the process to set up a NEW collection either from the collections header bar "+" button or as part of the overflow "Add to Collection" action within a movie...   Each of those methods allows me to type in a new collection name and drops me into a 'Collection" screen with the correct name and (if through the 2nd approach...) with the collection media reflected.   I was even able to upload a custom image for the collection.   However when I go back to the home screen, refresh, and go to the 'Collections' top bar tab, is just shows: 

"Nothing here.   

Collections allow you to enjoy personalized groupings of Movies, Series, and Albums. Click the '+' button to start creating collections." 

...with no actual collections listed on the screen.

Subsequent efforts to 'add to collection' efforts only reflect the NEW option and no drop down for previously established collections and yield the same result.

Note:  I do NOT have the setting enabled to have Jellyfin automatically set up collections (though I turned this on and off in testing) and I have NOT have installed the plugin that sets up collections automatically.

In the unraid docker appdata folder, there is no "Collections" subfolder nor any .xml files with the names of the collections I had tried to set up.

I have finished troubleshooting by:
* Confirmed my user account has check for "Allow this user to manage collections" (admittedly, this was not initially checked at set up and for a few days but even with checkmark now, issue persists)
* Checked the logs.  Nothing generated in the logs associated with set up of a 'new' Collection 
* Searching these forums, Unraid forums, Reddit, and internet more broadly for anyone else having this issue.  Didn't find any...
* Enabled (then disabled after a day) the Movies library setting to:  Automatically add to collection  - When at least 2 movies have the same collection name, they will be automatically added to the collection.
* Trying the above new 'collections set up' process from different instances and clients
* Running the "New permissions" tool in unraid (Jellyfin has no issues updating other files into the associated media shares nor the Jellyfin appdata folders"
* Restarted Jellyfin
* Restarted Unraid
 
I have not yet tried to fully wipe the docker and start over.  I figured I would ask here first...   Only other possible 'solution' I thought of was could I create a "Collections" folder and 'primer.xml' file under the folder user/appdata/Jellyfin/data/ to see if that first .xml helped break the file access logjam it seems to be experiencing...   I'm just not sure what the .xml file contents would need to look like.  Pretty sure I can google that...

Any other ideas?

John G

[bitmap]

Have you set up volumes for persistent data? Collections shouldn't need one on its own, but /config definitely does.

[theguymadmax]

There should be a collection folder in your config/data folder, same location as the playlist folder. Then a folder for each collection and a collection.xml file in each folder:

config/data/collections/Caminandes Collection [boxset]/collection.xml
config/data/collections/Another Collection [boxset]/collection.xml
config/data/playlists/

collection.xml file:

Code:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" standalone="yes"?>
<Item>
  <Added>07/07/2025 16:57:00</Added>
  <LockData>false</LockData>
  <Overview>Caminandes is an independently produced short animated series, inspired by the good old Chuck Jones cartoons.</Overview>
  <LocalTitle>Caminandes Collection</LocalTitle>
  <PremiereDate>2013-02-09</PremiereDate>
  <DisplayOrder>PremiereDate</DisplayOrder>
  <ProductionYear>2013</ProductionYear>
  <TmdbId>339473</TmdbId>
  <Genres>
    <Genre>Animation</Genre>
    <Genre>Comedy</Genre>
    <Genre>Family</Genre>
  </Genres>
  <Studios>
    <Studio>Blender Foundation</Studio>
    <Studio>Blender Animation Studio</Studio>
  </Studios>
  <CollectionItems>
    <CollectionItem>
      <Path>T:\Movies\Movies Collection\Caminandes 2 Gran Dillama (2013)\Caminandes 2 Gran Dillama (2013).mkv</Path>
    </CollectionItem>
    <CollectionItem>
      <Path>T:\Movies\Movies Collection\Caminandes Llama Drama (2013)\Caminandes Llama Drama (2013).mkv</Path>
    </CollectionItem>
    <CollectionItem>
      <Path>T:\Movies\Movies Collection\Caminandes 3 Llamigos (2016)\Caminandes 3 Llamigos (2016).mkv</Path>
    </CollectionItem>
  </CollectionItems>
</Item>

[greenawayj]

Thanks for reviewing and commenting...

This is exactly what I was expecting to see.  However "Creating" a new collection does not seem to 'create' the folder nor the xml in that location.   (though it seems the permissions are fine since it created a 
'playlist' folder and playlists I generate under config/data/... without issue.   

I think I might try to manually generate an collections folder and xml in that location and see if that somehow allows me to add my own through the UI after that...

UPDATE: Manually creating the "collections" folder and a collection.xml file (based on the one suggested by theguymafmax but updated with my movie information) in the proper location does not change anything...  The 'collection' is not seen by jellyfin.  It was a long shot as I assume the collection must also be in the database to be visible.   It's just such a strange problem.   Folder / file permissions for the data folder as well as 'playlists' and 'collections' and their respective xml files are exactly the same.

There should be a collection folder in your config/data folder, same location as the playlist folder. Then a folder for each collection and a collection.xml file in each folder:

config/data/collections/Caminandes Collection [boxset]/collection.xml
config/data/collections/Another Collection [boxset]/collection.xml
config/data/playlists/

collection.xml file:

Code:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" standalone="yes"?>
<Item>
  <Added>07/07/2025 16:57:00</Added>
  <LockData>false</LockData>
  <Overview>Caminandes is an independently produced short animated series, inspired by the good old Chuck Jones cartoons.</Overview>
  <LocalTitle>Caminandes Collection</LocalTitle>
  <PremiereDate>2013-02-09</PremiereDate>
  <DisplayOrder>PremiereDate</DisplayOrder>
  <ProductionYear>2013</ProductionYear>
  <TmdbId>339473</TmdbId>
  <Genres>
    <Genre>Animation</Genre>
    <Genre>Comedy</Genre>
    <Genre>Family</Genre>
  </Genres>
  <Studios>
    <Studio>Blender Foundation</Studio>
    <Studio>Blender Animation Studio</Studio>
  </Studios>
  <CollectionItems>
    <CollectionItem>
      <Path>T:\Movies\Movies Collection\Caminandes 2 Gran Dillama (2013)\Caminandes 2 Gran Dillama (2013).mkv</Path>
    </CollectionItem>
    <CollectionItem>
      <Path>T:\Movies\Movies Collection\Caminandes Llama Drama (2013)\Caminandes Llama Drama (2013).mkv</Path>
    </CollectionItem>
    <CollectionItem>
      <Path>T:\Movies\Movies Collection\Caminandes 3 Llamigos (2016)\Caminandes 3 Llamigos (2016).mkv</Path>
    </CollectionItem>
  </CollectionItems>
</Item>