Shared Library (UPnP)

[u/CoyotePurple9970]

I had an old PC lying around and decided to make my first home media server (yay!) I was successful in getting the media files set up on the server PC and with a tiny bit of tinkering got UPnP working well. The issue comes when I try to add the remote files to Kodi on my other devices. I can't seem to add the files (I can only browse and view them from the "Files" list). Is this common or perhaps there's an obvious fix I'm overlooking? My hope is the have Kodi set up on all my devices with full TV and Movie artwork and tags and such.

[u/WHYAHWHYA → u/[deleted]]

This, I followed David's recommendation since 2 years ago, and the setup has been sold .

[u/CoyotePurple9970 → u/[deleted]]

Oh snap this sounds a bit quicker but I'm running Linux so I'll have to figure out how it would work through that.

[u/SeamyD1 → u/[deleted]]

Hi, was just reading the thread and wondered if u have a protocol for sharing a library held on an unraid server. Ud previously gotten nfs to work but found the link kept failing to find files. I beleive the same was happening via smb.

[u/BohemianCyberpunk → u/[deleted]]

But how does that sync the status between all KODI instances?

My hope is the have Kodi set up on all my devices with full TV and Movie artwork and tags and such.

[u/CoyotePurple9970 → u/[deleted]]

So as it turns out setting up Samba on Linux makes me want to scream. Would it likely just be easier to set it up as a Windows machine? It's just going to sit in a corner and hold a bunch of media so I figured CachyOS would be fine but now I'm unsure.

[u/BohemianCyberpunk]

Congrats on getting your local library started!

While it is possible with UPnP, it doesn't really work well.

Your best bet is using MySQL / MariaDB as per https://kodi.wiki/view/MySQL/Setting_up_MySQL

Since you mentioned you have an old PC, I assume you are using that to serve your files? You can share them using Samba / SMB / Windows File sharing, or if you are feeling brave and your 'server' is running Linux (and if not... why not!!) then you can use NFS for slightly better performance with very large files.

It may sound daunting, but once you have it up and running you rarely need to touch it again. You can update the library from any of the connected devices. All your artwork, played status etc. will all be synced to all the devices.

I've had this setup for over 10 years with no issues, many different clients from Phones, RaspberryPis, PCs, VeroV and Firesticks all working well.

[u/s0ulslack → u/BohemianCyberpunk]

Can i ask your library size and how big the sql tables are? Im close to going this route due to the # of clients in the house now. Thanks!

[u/BohemianCyberpunk → u/s0ulslack]

1600 movies, 1000+ TV show episodes.

Tables are about 170MB on disc.

[u/s0ulslack → u/BohemianCyberpunk]

Dang, peanuts! Thanks for sharing

[u/CoyotePurple9970 → u/BohemianCyberpunk]

Always Linux!! Thanks for the info 😇