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docker-filebot

This is a Docker container for running FileBot, a media file organizer. The container has both a user interface as well as a fully automated mode. The GUI is exposed via RDP and HTTP. For the automated version, you just drop files into the input directory, and they'll be cleaned up and moved to the output directory.

This docker image is available on Docker Hub.

Usage

Interactive Method

To use this container for a user interface to FileBot:

docker run --name=FileBotUI -e WIDTH=1280 -e HEIGHT=720 -p 3389:3389 -p 8080:8080 -v /media/dir/path:/media:rw -v /config/dir/path:/config:rw coppit/filebot

In this mode, point the UI at the /media folder, which is shared with the host.

There are two ways to use the interactive user interface. One is to connect to the UI in your web browser with the URL http://host:8080/#/client/c/HandBrake. The second is to connect with a remote desktop client using port 3389. There are RDP clients for multiple platforms:

The second method is to point your web browser to http://<your docker host>:8080/. This will launch a web browser-based user interface.

Of course, if you change the host ports, then when you connect you'll have to specify the server as <host ip>:<host port>. Feel free to drop the 3389 mapping if you don't plan to use RDP, or the 8080 mapping if you don't plan to use the web browser.

Non-Interactive Method

If you want to run the container without a UI:

docker run --name=FileBot -d -v /input/dir/path:/input:rw -v /output/dir/path:/output:rw -v /config/dir/path:/config:rw coppit/filebot

With the default configuration, files written to the input directory will be renamed and copied to the output directory. It is recommended that you do not overlap your input and output directories. FileBot will end up re-processing files that it already processed, and generally make a mess of things.

Note that the /input path is writable above. This is because subtitles are first downloaded into the input directory before being moved to the output directory. Some people also prefer to move instead of renaming files. If you are paranoid about FileBot messing with your input files, and don't care about downloading subtitles, you can make /input read-only by removing ":rw".

When the container detects a change to the input directory, it will wait up to 60 seconds for changes to stop for 5 seconds. FileBot will be run if the directory stabilizes for 5 seconds, or if the 60 second maximum wait time elapses.

To check the status of the container, run:

docker logs FileBot

Both Methods

You can also combine all of the flags into one big command, to support both the UI as well as the automated conversion.

docker run --name=FileBot -e WIDTH=1280 -e HEIGHT=720 -p 3389:3389 -p 8080:8080 -v /media/dir/path:/media:rw -v /input/dir/path:/input:rw -v /output/dir/path:/output:rw -v /config/dir/path:/config:rw coppit/filebot

Just be careful not to use the /input directory with the UI. Otherwise you'll be triggering the automated update.

Configuration

When run for the first time, a config file named filebot.conf will be created in the config dir. (If you are upgrading from an old version, compare your existing filebot.conf against filebot.conf.new instead.) If you wish to download subtitles, edit the config file to set the username and password, as well as the language.

When run for the first time, a script named filebot.sh will be created in the config dir, and the container will exit. Edit this file, customizing how you want FileBot to run. For example, you might want to change the file rename formatting. Then restart the container.

While editing and testing your filebot.sh, keep in mind that FileBot (actually AMC) will not re-process files. Delete amc-exclude-list.txt in your config directory, then write a file into the input directory to get FileBot to re-process your files.

After you gain confidence in how the container is running, you may want to change the action from "copy" to "move". FileBot will move the files from the input to the output directory, then clean up any "leftover junk" in the input directory. If you're going to do this, then it's also probably a good idea to store temporary files and incomplete downloads in a different directory than the input directory, just in case FileBot decides to move them.

By default, FileBot will create files using user ID 0 (typically root) and group ID 0 (typically root), and with a umask of 0022. If you wish to change this, set the USER_ID, GROUP_ID, and UMASK environment variables to the right values from your host system. You can find the IDs using the "id" command. For example, for the user "nobody", it would be id -u nobody and id -g nobody. You can get the umask for a user like "nobody" by running su -l nobody -c umask.

The ALLOW_REPROCESSING setting controls whether FileBot can reprocess a file if it is created again in the input directory. You should delete amc-exclude-list.txt in your config directory if you enable this for the first time. Note that filebot will refuse to reprocess an input file if the output file already exists.

The USE_UI setting controls whether the user interface features are enabled. Set this to "yes" to enable the UI, which uses approximately 460MB of RAM, as opposed to 20MB of RAM. On my machine it uses .33% CPU instead of .03% CPU.

Updates to filebot.sh

Later, when you update the container, it may exit with this message in the log:

ERROR: The container's filebot.sh is newer than the one in /config. Copying the new script to /config/filebot.sh.new. Compare your filebot.sh and filebot.sh.new, being sure to copy over the VERSION line. Then restart the container.

This happens because some bugfix or something went into filebot.sh. Rather than deleting your filebot.sh (and losing any hard work you put into it), the container will write filebot.sh.new. It's your job to merge the two files. You can delete filebot.sh.new when you're done. NOTE: You must increase the VERSION even if you make no other changes. This will let the container know that you performed the merge. It will then start normally.

Advanced Configuration when Moving Files in FileBot

When using the non-interactive method, combined with FileBot's option to move instead of copy files, the moves can be slow if the container is configured with separate /input and /output directories. In this case, you can configure the container to operate on a single mounted volume. First, mount only the /media path:

docker run --name=FileBot -d -v /media/dir/path:/media:rw -v /config/dir/path:/config:rw coppit/filebot

Then, specify the INPUT_DIR and OUTPUT_DIR variables in your filebot.conf as subfolders of /media. Make sure that your output is not a subfolder of your input, or you'll confuse the change monitor.

Known Limitations

This container uses the inotify interface for watching for file system changes. This only works for kernel-supported file systems. It won't work for network shares.