[SOLVED] movie file path problems

[movie.Man]

i saw another thread on this some time back and i'm having similar problems with file paths

for instance, i could have a movie with the proper path displayed in the main window, but if i run the 'scan folders for new movies/changed paths' tool, the movie may be listed with an incorrect path and the path may be entirely different, such as:

correct path as displayed in main window: c:\movie\dvd
and path in the 'scan folders for new movies...' might be c:\movie\movie.avi'

even deleting (using CTRL) the movie record does not work

trying to edit the path from the 'scan folders for new movies...' window has never worked in any instance - any changes seem to be ignored

another user pointed out that the problem may be the number listed in the 'media type' input, but it's more than just that i think, at least in some instances - if i delete and re-create a record, i don't expect the path to be reported as incorrect when i run the  'scan folders for new movies...'  tool.

[rick.ca]

Sorry, it's not clear from your description what's going on. Please provide an example using real pathnames, and indicate whether the scanner is recommending a "Change file path" or "Add new movie."

If you're working with DVD rips (i.e., multiple .VOB files in a VIDEO_TS folder), confusing results can occur if the movie is not uniquely identified by it's folder name (i.e., the parent of VIDEO_TS). The scanner is designed to handle only one container file. So the regex matches another file to the same movie, it will suggest replacing all the DVD files with the one found. If that's the case, the problem is not that it's suggesting the change, but the regex are not able to correctly match filenames to titles.

[movie.Man]

all my videos are either uniquely named or, in the case where there are multiple files (DVD, etc), in uniquely named folders

ok - i see some of my problems are MY fault - in one instance i had 2 copies of a film, one DVD and one .avi, so PVD would list one path in the main UI and another in the scan tool UI.  still not sure why, after changing the path in the scan UI and processing the changes, it would not save the change, as was evident if i ran the scan tool again.

here's another problem though...

path in the main PVD UI:

J:\MEDIA\Film\DOCUMENTARY\PBS.NOVA - Everest - The Death Zone.avi

above is the correct path, but if i run the scan tool the path points to a a DVD:

J:\MEDIA\Film\DOCUMENTARY\Everest\ [and then all the .vob files for that DVD]

HOWEVER..........

the above JUST changed on me - i changed the name of the folder all my films were in and processed the changed paths through the scan tool and now the path as listed in the main PVD UI is:

J:\MEDIA\Film\DOCUMENTARY\PBS.NOVA - Everest - The Death Zone.avi|J:\MEDIA\Film\DOCUMENTARY\Everest\VIDEO_TS\VIDEO_TS.IFO|J:\MEDIA\Film\DOCUMENTARY\Everest\VIDEO_TS\VTS_01_0.IFO|J:\MEDIA\Film\DOCUMENTARY\Everest\VIDEO_TS\VTS_01_1.VOB|J:\MEDIA\Film\DOCUMENTARY\Everest\VIDEO_TS\VTS_01_2.VOB

one my biggest issues here, besides my own lack of sense on occasion, is that PVD displays these long paths on a single line (i think line feeds should be inserted after each file name) and this can be a headache

moving along, i just changed the path in the main UI (edit > CTRL+A to select path > del > browse to  J:\MEDIA\Film\DOCUMENTARY\PBS.NOVA - Everest - The Death Zone.avi) > save

now run the scan tool and it reports the old path with all the DVD files, minus the 'J:\MEDIA\Film\DOCUMENTARY\PBS.NOVA - Everest - The Death Zone.avi' file path

apparently the scan tool doesn't check to see if the path in the main UI is correct before scanning - maybe this is the heart of the problem?

[rick.ca]

all my videos are either uniquely named or, in the case where there are multiple files (DVD, etc), in uniquely named folders

That's not exactly what I meant by "unique." Understand the scanner is using the regex in your scanner configuration to find patterns in your filenames, extract a title, and then associate that with any existing title in your database. If there is a matching title in your database, then it will recommend adding the file found if there is nothing recorded in File path, or changing File path to that of the matching file if there is an existing value. The routine cannot "know" you have two records for the same title, and which files belong to each. So if you have two files matching the same title pattern, and neither have File path values, probably all the files for both records will be assigned to one of the records. If you have one record for a DVD with the files properly recorded and then scan the .AVI version, it will recommend replacing the DVD files with the .AVI.

For the scanner to work properly, you will need to...

• Make all Titles (or Title + Year) unique in the database.
• Make all Titles (or Title + Year) unique as they occur in your file pathnames.
• Ensure the regex in your scanner configuration will consistently recognize these unique values in the file pathnames.

[movie.Man]

this seems overly complex to me - maybe i'm not understanding something

if i use the windows file open dialog and browse to C:\ReadMe.txt, it's that file that gets executed, not C:\ReadMe\Don'tReadMe.txt

if the scan function would look at the path i specified for the file and it determines it is correct, then why would it even bother to look anywhere else?

sorry if i'm being thick here

[CAD]

Hi Movie.man

regular expression is difficult to understand.
PVD already comes preconfigured for common regular expressions.
For movies it reads the folder name rather than the files. the year helps to identify correct entry when search online databases.

most people adjust their movie naming standard to the regular expression.
I store my movies as ISO's rather than in video_ts folders.

The naming standard I use is the movie name as it appears in IMDB and in brackets the year.
eg. g:\multimedia\movies\Fingers (1978)\finger.pal.iso

or in your case
g:\multimedia\movies\Fingers (1978)\video_ts.
PVD will get the title from the folder name.

I have noticed if I have the same movie in 2 different locations, the scanner seams to flip flop between the two locations.

If you have the same movie as dvd in video_ts folder (or iso) and on avi., you could try storing them in the same folder and see what happens.

eg
J:\MEDIA\Film\DOCUMENTARY\Everest The Death Zone (2009)\PBS.NOVA - Everest - The Death Zone.avi
J:\MEDIA\Film\DOCUMENTARY\Everest The Death Zone (2009)\video_ts

[movie.Man]

@CAD - thanks for the help

storing in ISO format certainly makes sense

as for the Everest example, those 2 movies were completely different, thus my not understanding why PVD is considering 2 paths, but, alas, apparently this is where regex comes in, which i do know about - just that i'm terrible at understanding/writing them

still, it seems like such problems would be alleviated if PVD handled this a bit differently.  i guess my question would be; i'm not using regular expressions when i specify a path, so why is the scanner using them to verify a path instead of first considering whether the path i've specified is correct or not?

for new movies i understand this behavior... well, no i don't either, but i'll just accept that it's necessary and/or provides functionality.  however, when verifying a path, it just seems like the scanner should consider the path the user set instead of disregarding it and starting over.  this way one could [accidentally] have multiple copies of the same movie stored with different file names, or in different folders, or different movies with the same name in different folders, and there would be no problems.

[rick.ca]

when verifying a path, it just seems like the scanner should consider the path the user set instead of disregarding it and starting over.

Yes, this is a known issue, and nostra has indicated he will fix it. As I mentioned in your Feature Suggestion topic, the scanner can't handle adding a new file to one or more files already recorded in File path. So if I've previously added a trailer and then try to add a movie file for the same title, the scanner will recommend replacing the trailer with the movie. If I let it do so, next time it will do the reverse. As CAD said, it will "flip-flop."

But when you say "those 2 movies were completely different," I'm led to believe this may be contributing to your confusion, but is not the source of your problem. You have to respect the fact the routine is scanning the media on your HDD, using the provided regex to extract titles, and then recommending action based on that information. If you haven't adopted a consistent file-naming convention and configured the scanner with regex that will correctly handle that convention, you're going to have problems. If these two movies were uniquely named Titles in your database and their file pathnames were in a form the regex could correctly extract those unique titles from, then you wouldn't have a problem. The DVD files would be matched to the DVD version of the title, and the AVI would be matched to the AVI version.

[movie.Man]

yeah, i realize the problem with those particular files had to do with the regular expressions .  armed with that knowledge, i can make the corrections i need to.  thanks for the help!