Plex in Docker ?

This has been discussed many times before. The main reason for abandoning the Plugins is that there is only one developer/maintainer of plugins and it caused too much work. Also the plex plugin seemed to cause a lot of trouble and was tedious to maintain, while the docker container has a lot of support.

You are still free to just install Plex on the mainsystem via CLI.

Zitat von Procus Aquila

My media data is located on a separate NAS, which means that I would have to consider several structures via docker to access these drives.

It's easier if Plex is installed directly, then you can use the wonderful "remote mount" tool.

Also with docker you can use the "remote mount" tool and just "bind mount" the mounted directory as a volume in docker. No need to install docker on the other system as long as "just" media files are served.

You should look at techodadlife videos or DB tech. They have many guides that are really straight forward.

Also if you look at other platforms, you would see that basically everyone use docker for everything when it comes to homelabs. It's easy to use and manage and doesn't require the OMV/freenas/unraid developer to waste time in a plugin.

Hi If I may ask,

=> if I install OMV as a service on Debian, and plex as a service on Debian will the two play nice ?

=> what are the downside of using Plex via Docker (performance?)
=> what are the upside of using Plex via docker (easier to install?)

Zitat von DrX

Hi If I may ask,

=> if I install OMV as a service on Debian, and plex as a service on Debian will the two play nice ?

=> what are the downside of using Plex via Docker (performance?)
=> what are the upside of using Plex via docker (easier to install?)

There is no reason you can not install Plex and OMV as packages on Debian so long as your hardware architecture supports them.

I know of no downside to Plex on docker.

Plex on docker is easier to update if the proper image is used and the container is properly configured. It does not rely on any repositories.

Thank you, I'm still pondering If I shall retry OMV as a Debian service or go with OMV as main..

The only advantage I can see for Installing Debian and then installing OMV directly is that Debian will allow you to control the partitioning and the OMV iso installer will not. This isn't important to me so I used the OMV iso and deleted the swap partition later by hand and expanded the single partition to use the whole disk.

Others may have other reasons for going one way or the other.

that's an other issue.. my plex need a lot more that 2gb so I will need to do this as well (remove the swap increase the omv partition) and I dont know how to do it.. neither on linux nor if OMV let you do it ( seems un likely)

Zitat von DrX

that's an other issue.. my plex need a lot more that 2gb so I will need to do this as well (remove the swap increase the omv partition) and I dont know how to do it.. neither on linux nor if OMV let you do it ( seems un likely)

You would never want the Plex Media Server Database to be located on your rootfs. Its size can not be predicted, other than to say it will grow over time as you add more media to your collection.

You can boot to Gparted to remove the swap partition and grow the OS partition.

Erph so Its even more complicated than what I thought..

lets recap:
if i use debian, I should specify :
1 sys partition of 2 to 4Gb ? you call it rootfs
1 general partition , where plex db will be and ? omv will be ? ( how to I tell plex to go there ?)
1 swap Partition

if I use the OMV iso i should
boot into a live Gparter,
delete the swap
expend the 2 gb partition ? to the whole disk ? (what about not using rootfs for plex?)
so => create a partion for plex DB , some how telle OMV to use it -_-
create a swap = memory size , tell OMV that the swap chaged

Although OMV may start out being comfortable in 2-4GB, I would not start out with a partition of that size. Mine's on a 16GB SSD and OMV currently consumes 9GB of that. It took years to get that large though, and I use the machine for other things besides OMV that need some rootfs space.

OMV will be on your rootfs. It's just a package installed into Debian if you do not use the OMV iso installer.

Plex is two things. A service program and a metadatabase. The service runs from your rootfs (or a docker). The metadatabase can be and should be on another drive, or partition. You can look on the Plex forums for directions on how to move the metadatabase. https://forums.plex.tv/

Have swap if you need it. Most don't, and many of those do not even know that they can get by without it. If you have at least 8GB of RAM you most likely don't need swap. But start out with swap and see if you can get by without it by disabling it. If you don't have problems after some reasonable amount of testing, then you can then delete the swap partition and grow your other partition or partitions. If testing shows you must have some swap, reenable it.

If you use the OMV iso you will get a swap partition. I do not know how large it will be - it varies by how much RAM you have and how large the install disk is.

You can either boot a live GParted disk, or use use OMV's installable Gparted and boot to that one time. Then remove the swap partition and grow the others, then boot back into OMV and make any needed tweaks (follow steps 7 and maybe 8 in the OMV Flash Memory plugin).

Don't put the Plex metadatabase on the rootfs. It will likely start out there because that is the default, but you need to move it elsewhere. Info on Plex Forums.

Swap has traditionally been 1-2X RAM size. But say you have 16GB of RAM and are installing the OS to a 16GB disk (this is my exact use case). How much swap will the installer decide you will end up with?

about the "metadatabase" or more precisely the

/var/lib/plexmediaserver/Library/Application Support/Plex Media Server/  

folder and subfolders, plex forum were not so helpfull,
I found this web that explain how to use simlinnk
https://smyl.es/how-to-move-pl…20.8690240383148193359375

and some one else that mentioned an easier way but I did not quite understood exactly what to do:

"it's simple enough. If the media storage is only for plex, you don't even need a symlink, you can just mount it into place through a line in /etc/fstab"

do you undestand what kind of edit will work on the ftsab ?

I dont want to mess with the system not knowing what I'm doing..
I imagine a line like:

/var/lib/plexmediaserver/Library/Application Support/Plex Media Server/            /dev/sdb2/Plex Media Server/        defaults 1

Don't symlink it or bind mount it in fstab.

You need to create a service override file that specifies your chosen location for the library. This is the only supported by Plex method to do this.

See: https://forums.plex.tv/t/moving-pms-library/197342

You may want to reconsider your decision not to run Plex in docker. Docker is the smarter move.

when run in docker, plex's plexmediaserver/Library/Application Support/Plex Media Server/ will be placed in the docker container right?
but isn't this container on the main /root partition rather than in home?

Plex's plexmediaserver/Library/Application Support/Plex Media Server/ will be placed where you tell it to be placed. It can be anywhere on any drive.

Same thing with the docker image and container storage location You can place it anywhere on any drive.

Ok I'll try , one last question, considering I have a plex install on the windows partition with a "/Library/Application Support/Plex Media Server/" already made.. pointing to this location would be pushing it :o) right ?
I'll better create a new location

About PUID and PGID,
some guides recommend to find the ID of the linux debian user so in my case  id drx some guides recommend to find the id of the admin  id admin

its a little confusing , do we need to configure portainer with the linux user acount or the omv admin acount

I used my debian id , and it worked.
my path are as follow: and worked fine ( note that /home point to a partition created during debian install)

I did not want to push my luck so instead of pointing to the windows plex app data, I chose to create a linux only app data as stated above.. now when trying to copy the data from win to linux (its not as easy as dragging a folder :() I tried

rsync --recursive /srv/dev-disk-by-id-ata-M4-CT256M4SSD3_0000000013140376A758-part2/Users/NAS/AppData/Local/Plex Media Server/Media /home/plexappdata/Library/Application Support/Plex Media Server/Media

but this gave me a bunch of errors

link_stat "/srv/dev-disk-by-id-ata-M4-CT256M4SSD3_0000000013140376A758-part2/Users/NAS/AppData/Local/Plex" failed: No such file or directory (2)

rsync: link_stat "/root/Media" failed: No such file or directory (2)

rsync: change_dir "/root//Server" failed: No such file or directory (2)

rsync: link_stat "/home/plexappdata/Library/Application" failed: No such file or directory (2)

rsync: change_dir "/root//Support" failed: No such file or directory (2)

rsync: link_stat "/root/Media" failed: No such file or directory (2)

rsync: change_dir#3 "/root//Server" failed: No such file or directory (2)

rsync error: errors selecting input/output files, dirs (code 3) at main.c(720) [Receiver=3.1.3]