Disable Online MetaData for Select Videos

As for our suggestion, I'd say if there is a way to tell Serviio not to attempt to identify a particular video, it will be very helpful.

We had to ultimately turn the feature off because while many videos were properly identified, there's a lot of educational content shared to schools through our Serviio server that were misidentified as movies through the imdb database causing lots of confusion.

I know it's possible to create a separate folder and disabling metadata on it, but when using Serviio in an environment with thousands of users, it adds complexity. Our folders are organized by classroom and building.

I'd recommend if a user can add a select prefix or phrase to the filename of a video file that tells Serviio NOT to attempt to do a metadata search, it would be sufficient. A graphical option or database isn't needed. For example, we know you can amend the filename of a movie with the imdb DB# (ex. tt24202384) to force Serviio to see it as this movie. Perhaps allowing a user to include a word or phrase within the filename to exclude Serviio from attempting to identify it would be the best way to do this. We can just then add this phrase to the filename of misidentified videos.

Thanks,
Alan

[atc98092]

There’s a pretty simple way to do this. Any media that you don’t want Serviio to search for online metadata, you place them in a separate folder, not below an existing Serviio library location, and disable metadata extraction for that particular location. I use this method for my test videos that have no metadata available. Then the file name is all that appears in Serviio.

There’s a pretty simple way to do this. Any media that you don’t want Serviio to search for online metadata, you place them in a separate folder, not below an existing Serviio library location, and disable metadata extraction for that particular location. I use this method for my test videos that have no metadata available. Then the file name is all that appears in Serviio.

Yes I did acknowledge this method but I still think it's better to allow another way. For us, we organize our folders by school name and class. Creating a separate folder just for misidentified videos will cause confusion.

[atc98092]

The problem with what you're asking requires a media administration function. Serviio does not have any media admin capability, and the developer (in the past) wasn't really interested in creating one. I'm not try to speak for him, but that was his past position. Because of the method that Serviio uses for database access, you can't have a 3rd party application connect to the database while Serviio is running. So if someone did write a media admin application you would have to completely shut Serviio down to allow access to the DB.

Would I like a media admin function along the lines of what can be done in Plex? Certainly. It would be nice to change the image used for the video, and even edit the metadata manually. As you say, a toggle to disable metadata retrieval on a per file basis could certainly be part of it. If I still had the energy to try to code again, I could try something in Visual Basic, as that's the only programming language I know. And that would make it Windows only. I'm going to retire most likely some time next year. Perhaps if no one has built something, I can occupy my time with that attempt.

Yes I understand. The best I can do is share suggestions for functionality. In some fairness, Serviio was designed with home consumers in mind and not really an enterprise/business purpose so it makes sense priority and focus goes into what matters really for home users. What we are recommending is more useful in an enterprise environment (educational in our case).

Anyhow, Best wishes!