I have set up my Appdata like so:

 

 

1. if i browse the files via File Manager, i see an appdata folder on /mnt/cache, plus an appdata folder on /mnt/user0, with different contents?

 

2. If i start the mover, i see files moving FROM cache to Array instead of the other way around, while there is plenty of room on the cache pool.

 

? i'm confused to what location the 'appdata' share is pointing (cache or array), why mover seems to be moving files away from cache, and what paths i should define in docker setups, /mnt/user/appdata or /mnt/cache/appdata.

 

You appear to be using the mover tuning plugin, remove it and retest.

Yes, the mover tuning plugin was part of the problem because "Test mode (Dry run)" was set to yes.

 

And i have learned that i had to set "Rebalance Shares" in the Mover options to "Yes" in addition to setting the "Mover action"  to "Array->cache" in the Share settings of the share appdata. After i had set those two options and started the mover, i saw all contents of /mnt/disk/appdata in the array indeed move to /mnt/cache/appdata in cache.  After that i set "Secondary storage" in the Share settings op appdata to "None" to keep the Docker data always in the cache pool.

 

Now i also know im good if i keep referring to /mnt/user/appdata when installing docker containers, Unraid keeps track where files in /mnt/user/appdata point to, depending on the Share settings and the cache/move status.

 

The help text to the option "Rebalance shares" is somewhat confusing, it reads "This will move files from shares to their primary and secondary storage if spread elsewhere. May imply moving older files from Primary->Secondary or Secondary->Primary if allowed (cache:prefer or cache:yes) to free some space." , it means (if i'm not mistaken) "This will move files from shares to their primary or secondary storage if spread elsewhere, the direction of movement is based on the "Mover action" setting in the Share settings. May imply moving older files from Primary->Secondary or Secondary->Primary if allowed (based on the Mover action) to free some space.".

Also it doesn't help that the terms "primary" and "secondary" storage are used in the help text, and in the "Mover action" the terms "cache"  and "array" used. It would make more sense to me if the "Mover action" options were titled "primary -> secondary"  and "secondary -> primary".

 

So, in the end to get al the appdata files from the array to cache,

- i set Mover action to Array->Cache in the settings of the share

- i set "Rebalance shares" to yes

- i started the mover and saw the appdata folder in the array (/mnt/disk/appdata) empty and the /mnt/cache/appdata folder fill

- after the mover was done, i set the Secondsry storage to "none" in the share settings.

 

Edited February 12, 20251 yr by peewee67