plex-update.md

Plex Automatic Updates (UNIX/RPM)

Installation

1. Create a working directory for your updates, ex: /root/scripts/plex-update/
2. Download a copy of plex-update.sh and make it executable
3. Find your Plex Token
4. nano plex-update.sh and set the PLEX_TOKEN variable
5. Test the script ./plex-update.sh
6. Schedule the updates regularly:

• crontab -e
• 0 3 * * * cd /root/scripts/plex-update && ./plex-update.sh
• Need help with cron syntax? https://www.binarybabel.org/tech/os/unix/cron/

Advanced Topics

Monitoring for failed/stuck udpates with an NMS

You can serve status.xml to a local web-server and check its output with a network monitoring system.

cp -av $UPDATE_STATUS_FILE /srv/www/htdocs/ # Optional, for NMS

Use a web-check to search for the string 'size="1"', or alternatively
parse the xml file and use the XPath count(/MediaContainer[@size=1]).

plex-update.sh

#!/bin/bash
set -e
umask 0002

PLEX_TOKEN="INSERT_YOUR_TOKEN_HERE"
UPDATE_STATUS_FILE="plex-updates.xml"

curl --silent -o $UPDATE_STATUS_FILE "127.0.0.1:32400/updater/status?X-Plex-Token=$PLEX_TOKEN"
# cp -av $UPDATE_STATUS_FILE /srv/www/htdocs/ # Optional, for NMS
if [ -n "$(grep notify $UPDATE_STATUS_FILE)" ] ; then
  echo "Update available!"
  UPDATE_URL=$(grep -oPm1 "(?<=downloadURL=\")[^\"]+" $UPDATE_STATUS_FILE)
  echo $UPDATE_URL
  if [ -n "$UPDATE_URL" ] ; then
    set -x
    curl -L -o plex-update.rpm "$UPDATE_URL" && service plexmediaserver stop && rpm -Uvh plex-update.rpm
    service plexmediaserver start
    set +x
    echo "Update finished."
  fi
fi