The Android TV device was running the latest Channels Beta v2021.10.22.1531 on AndroidTV 9. It is a Xiaomi Mi Smart Compact Video Projector ("MiProjM05" on DVR Clients page).
The DVR was on pre-release v2021.10.29.0103 at the time.
Upon turning on the Android TV device and then opening the Channels app, all movies were completely missing from the Movies section and throughout all the other sections, including Library, Recordings, and Search. TV shows, however, were unaffected: they were still visible throughout the app and playable.
The issue was temporarily worked around by rebooting the device, upon which the movies reappeared. However, the next time the device was turned on (cold boot) and the Channels app was started, the movies were missing again. This time, I submitted diagnostics (see further below) and took some photos.
Empty Movies section:
To troubleshoot, I first tried updating the DVR (to the then-latest v2021.10.29.2011) but no change.
Then, I briefly played part of a movie from the Web UI, and only that movie (The Incredibles) was now visible (and playable) on the app, while all others were missing. I repeated this with another movie, and it too was then made visible.
Movies section after watching a movie (on the Web UI) makes it alone visible in the app:
(Additionally, the only Genres shown are those of the only movie visible):
Finally, I tried adding General > Manage Navigation > Movies to the device-specific override on the DVR's Clients page, then disabling & re-enabling it, and lo-and-behold, all the movies returned! (All without ever force-quitting the Channels app on the device.) I then submitted diagnostics a second time (below).
Also of note: I've kept General > Manage Navigation > Movies enabled globally on the DVR for many months now with no issues until this.
The movies have stayed visible for now, but I wouldn't want someone else to encounter this and be unable to watch their movies!
I hope these two sets of diagnostics help to figure out what triggered this interesting bug:
- Diagnostics while all the movies were missing:
- Android TV: f699f252-1904-4c23-abcd-2ed1cb6e3238
- DVR: 20e94604-462c-4ab5-a684-44077da24917
- Diagnostics after toggling General > Manage Navigation > Movies which surprisingly made the movies reappear:
- Android TV: 7832c353-8205-4c17-afd5-f035160db3bb
- DVR: dfba22cf-6ca4-44a3-9c38-7aeb065afe01