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[DancingMan]

I have several animated Christmas shows in my library - for example: Frosty the Snowman.  My file names for movies tend to be MovieName_(Year) and for TV Shows I use SeriesName_SxEx.  These generally work great... except for TV Shows that are a single episode (or a "special").  The only way I can seem to get the info for Frosty is to import it as a movie so it gets the info from TMDb and then manually change the Media Sub Type to "TV Show" so it gets grouped with my other TV Shows.  Is there a way to have the system automatically get the data from TVDB like a series would?  I've tried using names like Frosty_the_Snowman_S1E1 or Frosty_the_Snowman_S0E1, but those don't seem to work.

[CountryBumkin]

If the show (Frosty) is actually "TV Show" and not a Movie you have to tag it as TV Show or MC doesn't know what database to look at for the tagging info.

See this http://www.mymovies.dk/how-to/written-documentation.aspx?Page=TVSeries_Folders_And_Files for info on how to tag/create filenames. There are other ways to do it (that will work in MC) but this method has always worked for me.

[astromo]

Sounds like you should set up your import template for TV to:
[Series]_S[Season]E[Episode]
By import, I really mean using F12. You'd probably need to set up the import meta data template up manually. It's probably on auto and can't work out how to deal with the under score. I use spaces and that has been straight forward.

If you do this a couple of times Carnac may start to get the idea.

I'm on a bus on my phone but I think that will be close to what you need.

[DancingMan]

The problem seems to be due to the "Series" field.  For the show "24", if I name the file "24_S5E6", when I Get Movie and TV Info, MC knows "24" is the Series, and I want Season 5 Episode 6.  For a show like Frosty, there is no "Series" name, just the "Episode" name.  If I use "Frosty_the_Snowman", it doesn't search the TV database because it doesn't think it's a show without a Season & Episode number.  If I use "Frosty_the_Snowman_S1E1", it searches the TV database but comes back blank - but if I use a 24 episode it works and if I go to thetvdb.com and search it I can find Frosty.  Again, this only seems to happen with single episode shows.

[muzicman0]

Most likely, it's because it isn't a TV show, it's a movie played on TV.

[DancingMan]

Hmmm... I hadn't thought of it as a 30 minute movie.  But, when getting the Movie & TV info, MC sets the media subtype as TV Show on it's own (maybe based on the length).  It just doesn't get all of the other information because it needs a Series Name and Season & Episode numbers.

[astromo]

May be completely coincidental but I'm suspicious that the use of underscores in your naming convention may be the cause or a contributing factor here.

I'm suspicious that MC is mis-reading the name as a long concatenated text string. I don't know the details of how the code works to be sure one way or the other. One for the devs. I do know that underscores are used by MC for special characters used for meta-data that don't translate to an acceptable file name, e.g. ":". It's possible that MC is ignoring them or treating your long names incorrectly.

You could test this out by renaming a file without them and see how you go. I use a wysiwyg approach to file names and don't add dashes, dots or any other character and have no problem. I ready CountryBumkin's advice and it appears sound to me. Did you try it out?

Also, did you check what the Wiki has to offer?

[RoderickGI]

Take a look at the way Frosty the Snowman is recorded in The TV DB: http://thetvdb.com/?tab=season&seriesid=258006&seasonid=489758&lid=7
It is recorded as a Special, not an episode. Read the rules for Specials: http://www.thetvdb.com/wiki/index.php?title=Special_Episodes

Look at the Stargate example: http://thetvdb.com/?tab=season&seriesid=72449&seasonid=4147&lid=7

Clicking on the Special line (or the word Special) will show you the detail: http://thetvdb.com/index.php?tab=episode&seriesid=72449&seasonid=19916&id=329320
Note the "Airs Before" and "DVD Season" fields.

Frosty the Snowman should have a file name of "Frosty the Snowman S00E01" or "Frosty_the_Snowman_S00E01" or similar, or have a Name of "Frosty the Snowman", a Season number of zero and an Episode number of one in the Tags, be marked as a TV Show, then it should import successfully.

Note that I haven't tested this in MC, as I am typing one handed, with a small dog asleep on my left arm.  .


EDIT: I just looked at Frosty's detailed records, and the Season is blank. So if the above doesn't work, try a file name of "Frosty_the_Snowman_SE01", "Frosty_the_Snowman_S  E01", "Frosty_the_Snowman_S__E01" or similar.