SOLVED: Whats the proper way to rescan for images without replacing

[skitz0]

So, when I began my Jellyfin journey I threw my shows on to my Ubuntu server (where Jellyfin is running with a standard install).. 500 shows later and issues because I decided to take the lazy route, and not following Jellyfins naming conventions, I'm paying for it now. As I'm slowly working on this I'm getting double the episodes, S01xE02  S01xE02  S01xE03 S01xE03 1 for old, 1 for new. For now I've been --> Refresh metadata --> replace all metadata (with the replace images unchecked) and yet, I still end up with photos getting replaced.

Is there a certain way to do this so I can keep what I choose? Maybe a way to 'Lock' a show's photos?

If I were to go as far as unchecking all the metadata suppliers/addons would the shows that don't have photos saved in there folders have still get artwork?

[TheDreadPirate]

Which photos are being replaced? The per episode image? If so, that is probably unavoidable since Jellyfin considers the renamed file a new item. Are you saving your images with the media? Sounds like you are.

Disabling image providers means that shows that don't already have images, either with the media or in Jellyfin's metadata directory, will not get images.

[skitz0]

My bad, I probably should've said images as in poster, backdrop, banner, thumb, clearlogo.

I've been using "Rename My TV Series" app to rename and create .nfo files. I tried TinyMediaManager but it usually only got the poster.jpg In hindsight, I should've just got the paid version but I was testing out MediaElch and Ember. Long story short, I'm right where I started, only with some shows having .nfo some having different images, just A cluster fudge.

When I did have the 'Save images in folders' it never actually saved the images into the shows folder, is it supposed to download those images into /media/tvShows/Fringe (2008 )/poster.jpg or somewhere like /var/lib/jellyfin/metadata

I'm starting to think I should start fresh and do something along the lines of 'find . -type f -iname \*.jpg -delete' also .nfo and get the paid version of TMM. By any chance do you know if the paid version will get most of the images?

Any recommendations would be appreciated.

[TheDreadPirate]

If you are using external apps for NFOs and images, you need to disable ALL metadata providers, all image providers, do not check NFO saver, and do not check "save images with media". Jellyfin should then use what you provide. Tiny Media Manager should be naming everything correctly.

[ZmgwsYzhM2nV]

Yeah, except when you edit the NFO files later, Jellyfin doesn't pick up the changes...

[TheDreadPirate]

IIRC, Jellyfin only reads the NFOs during initial scan, yes. Or a "replace all metadata" scan type. There is no way to change this behavior without a code change.

[ZmgwsYzhM2nV]

Right, but it used to work a couple of versions ago though. And what would be wrong with a change in code to bring the proper behavior back?

[skitz0]

This has probably been one of the most fruitless issues I've wasted time on. I'm not sure why I keep diverting from an already reliable software works just fine. Every issue has been self inflicted, but educational.
Is there a reason to choose .nfo's over metadata downloader's? I have over 600 show's and have yet to not get info from the metadata provides. I really jumped into this because I wanted a"permanent" way to keep certain primary posters if I needed to refresh~>replace metadata.but if I named + put a selected poster.jpg in the root of the Shows DIR, It'll still be the poster if I did do a replace? 

Appreciate the time and patience.

[Efficient_Good_5784]

If you select to store NFOs next to your media, Jellyfin will just use the metadata provider(s) info to fill the NFOs out.

If you for some reason move your media to a new server and provided the NFOs match existing files, Jellyfin will just pick up the metadata from them if NFOs are also enabled there.

[TheDreadPirate]

I gave NFOs a try, but opted to just put the TMDB ID in the folder name to ensure consistent identification.

Using Kodi is another reason to use NFOs.