Jellyfin for Kodi issues

#1

Using Jellyfin v10.3.7 running in Docker on Debian Linux Buster, you create favorites which are accessible through the web interface via the Home Page under the tab Favorites. Works as advertised.

It would be nice to be able to heart (favorite) an actor and have their profile page accessible in favorites. A workaround is to create a collection and put the actor inside the collection, which adds an extra click to access the content.

Running Kodi v18 on Windows 7 with Jellyfin for Kodi v0.2.1, things don’t work as advertised. Live TV doesn’t work at all, it does in the web version. Live TV through just Kodi using the Tvheadend plugin works as it always has. Movies and TV Shows are accessible and respond very snappy using the default Kodi links but trying to play anything results in an error about not being able to find the file and asking to delete it from the library. In order to play anything you have to use the (dynamic) links accessible from the Jellyfin for Kodi addon. It’s slow to load when using those links but you can play anything you want. This is using the Native (direct paths) mode.

Trying to access Favorites (through the Jellyfin for Kodi addon) using the Native (direct paths) mode results in the same error as above about not finding the file.

Switching over to Addon mode and using the Tv Shows (dynamic) links as above through the Jellyfin for Kodi addon, TV Shows do not work correctly as trying to play any file results in playing only the last episode of a season, no matter what episode you try to play. Pressing info results in the correct info being displayed and showing the correct episode that is playing (the last episode of the season) but not the one you picked to play. I did not try to use the Kodi [Movies and TV Shows native links] in addon mode so I don’t know what that does.

These are the issues I am running into while attempting to setup Jellyfin for Kodi to work as I had it setup through Kodi only by itself. I like the Jellyfin backend, I’m just wondering if the issues above can be fixed by some setting somewhere or if these are continuing issues for the freshly released Jellyfin for Kodi plugin. Thank you for any insight you can provide for this new Jellyfin user.

#2

Hi there,

I have added your request about adding actors to the favourites section. You can request other features you’d like to see added to jellyfin here

Would you be able to upload your kodi log for us to look at as this is strange behaviour and I know many others use the addon without any issues? Instructions on how to do this can be found on the Kodi Website

Granted there are some issues with the addon at the moment but you should be able to watch TV shows and movies without any problem. We’re still working on a better understand of the plugin and I’m not sure Live TV is supported/working at this time

Thanks for your patience

TrueTechy

#3

Thank you for getting in touch with me about these issues. I have included screenshots below that should go along with my post above. I will look into including a log as soon as I am able to do so. I have looked through Kodi and Jellyfin’s logs myself but never found anything to aid in my search for answers on why I am having the issues I am having but I’m not a coder, so find the logs a little overwhelming to decipher.

I apologize in advance for the hoops needed to access the screenshots but this forum would not let me post them because I am a new user.

*Some of the below screenshots were taken through Teamviewer and have refresh rate issues but have nothing to do with the content of the screenshot.

The Screenshots Are Here

Here is a screenshot of the Jellyfin For Kodi Addon settings. Playback mode is set to Native.
Screenshot #1 Here
This creates an entry for TV Shows in the Jellyfin For Kodi Addon.
Screenshot #2 Here
This is the path for that menu item. We’ve set up a shortcut for the homepage here.
Screenshot #3 Here
Here we’ve traveled into the dynamic TV Shows entry and selected a show. Everything plays correctly this way. So we’ve no need to show any more about this.
Screenshot #4 Here
Here is a menu shortcut for Kodi’s default TV Shows path. This was created by Kodi on install by default, so nothing was changed here.
Screenshot #5 Here
Let’s travel into Kodi’s settings to take a closer look at this automatic path. In the Media settings under Library, we select the entry for Videos. Anything inside this menu was created automatically by Kodi and Jellyfin.
Screenshot #6 Here
We see 2 automatically created entries for Jellyfin. The top one is empty and shows nothing but doesn’t pop up anything, it simply lets you go back with an arrow like you see below. Clicking on the second Jellyfin entry does something different, continue to the next screenshot for more.
Screenshot #7 Here
Clicking on the second Jellyfin entry shows that it cannot connect. However we know that Jellyfin works as we have just showed we can play a show from the dynamically created links in screenshot #4. (Note: I have deleted both of these entries and told the Jellyfin addon to completely recreate the library and these entries were recreated.)
Screenshot #8 Here
Lets see how the default TV Shows link created by Kodi from screenshot #5 works by trying to play the exact same show as screenshot #4.
Screenshot #9 Here
It asks to delete the entry because it cannot find the path. So you cannot use Kodi’s default paths, which means it shouldn’t create these paths to begin with. It would be better if this worked though because without it, you cannot use Favorites or anything else Kodi related, everything must go through the Jellyfin Addon in order for anything to work.
Screenshot #10 Here
Let’s travel back to the Jellyfin For Kodi Addon we see in screenshot #2. We find Favorite Shows which were created from the Jellyfin web control panel. Since these were created by Jellyfin and are found inside the Jellyfin Addon where we know the TV Shows work, we expect these to work as well. So let’s try with a TV Show that we have put in the favorites from the Jellyfin web access point.
Screenshot #11 Here
Nope, we get the same effect as trying to play media through Kodi’s auto created links as per screenshot #10.
Screenshot #12 Here

#4

Hi,

I’ve took a look through the screenshots you provided but I have been unable to replicate the issues you’re having on my testing instance, if you’d be able to enable debug mode on the jellyfin addon and setup your server again then upload the kodi log for us to look at, that should hopefully help us narrow down where the problem is

Thanks

#5

I finally got Native mode to work, IMO it’s very poorly documented and there’s one “gotcha” which doesn’t apply in your case since you’re using Windows.

  1. Add your libraries in Jellyfin and in Optional Network Path add in the SMB path to your shares in the normal Windows way (\\server\path which is different than the Unix smb://server/path this is what screwed me up for hours), wait for everything to be imported

  2. Create a passwordless user called guest (not sure if this is setup by default in Windows), this seems to be hardcoded in the Jellyfin For Kodi plugin since I was using the standard nobody user on my Linux server and it kept failing to login, even though Kodi itself had no issues.

  3. Start with a fresh database in Kodi (no kodi libraries or Jellyfin libraries), add in your SMB shares, but you don’t need to import anything.

  4. Add in your libraries using the JFK plugin

  5. Profit!

#6

I actually have one client on Windows 7 and one client on Debian Linux 10. Both being served from a Docker container on a Debian Linux 10 server. Both clients behave in the same manor where after you have finished watching a show, Kodi will throw a popup saying that it cannot find the file from the show you just watched. Upon restarting Kodi, there is always a popup right from the start saying it cannot find some random file, “do you want to stop scanning?” and if you hit “No” there are no more popup alerts until after you have finished playing something.

Thanks for the tip on the Optional Network Path, I’ve gone in and set that up. That may work on the Windows client but break on the Linux client.

Is the guest account necessary? I have Jellyfin for Kodi logged in with a different user for each client.

I will update this when I am able to run these new tests. Thanks.