Medium (I first filed this issue on the QnA site: https://answers.atlassian.com/questions/243982/sourcetree-doesn-t-refresh-files-in-the-working-tree; I got feedback from Kieran Senior that I should file it as a bug.)
I've been using SourceTree on Mac for a few months and I've been really happy with it.
But recently something happened and SourceTree stopped auto-refreshing the "Files in the working tree" panel. So now if I change some code file and save it, then flip over to SourceTree, I don't see the change reflected in that panel and I'm forced to take some manual action to force-refresh it.
I tried upgrading to SourceTree 1.7 and again to 1.8. That didn't help.
I tried going to Settings - Advanced and making sure that these checkboxes are checked:
- Automatically Refresh (if disabled you must manually refresh this repository)
- Refresh remote status in the background (if enabled in global preferences)
That didn't help either.
I've found that any of the following actions can serve as a "force refresh":
- Restarting SourceTree
- Unchecking and rechecking the checkboxes mentioned above
- Flipping the dropdown from "Show Pending" to "Show Untracked" and back.
Is there some other setting I'm not aware of? Is this a known bug? Is there a keyboard shortcut to force refresh the "Files in the working tree" panel?
thanks!
--S
[SRCTREE-2020] SourceTree doesn't refresh files in the working tree
Why am I always receiving emails regarding this issue? I am not on any watch list, and have nothing to do with Source Tree. Please remove me.
Same issue here - I can see the new file in the file system, yet sourceTree does not reliably pick it up.
In my case this is in a directory where I often have & see changes, but for some funny reason this time there's no change, and even trying to force it with F5 does not work.
This is the single biggest problem with sourcetree - yet it's not fixed? Brilliant.
Even a restart of sourceTree did not pick it up.
And of course with a git status I can see the file.
This is on win10, mind.
after years of frustration I've stopped waiting for ST updates and switched to GitKraken and I'm happy with it:
not such problems, frequent updates, inline diff and much more
regarding all of its great features the price is nothing
Thank you Dragan Filipović for your comment, and to Garam Song for pointing me to it. 
This workaround worked for me too! 
Garam Song
added a comment - Just realized that there were 46 other comments above the recent ones. I followed what `Dragan Filipovic` instructed to do, and auto-refresh started working for me again!
I had previously opened the repository directly from the folder, not through the repository browser. When I opened it through the repository browser, deleted the bookmark, re-added it, and opened it through the browser, auto-refresh started working again.
Garam Song
added a comment - Just realized that there were 46 other comments above the recent ones. I followed what `Dragan Filipovic` instructed to do, and auto-refresh started working for me again!
I had previously opened the repository directly from the folder, not through the repository browser. When I opened it through the repository browser, deleted the bookmark, re-added it, and opened it through the browser, auto-refresh started working again. I am on a Mac 10.13.6 with SourceTree 3.0.1 (205), and the issue is that local file changes do not refresh automatically in SourceTree. This actually used to work, until it stopped working out of the blue a few months into using SourceTree every day. I have confirmed that 'General Preferences –> Refresh automatically when files change' and repository settings 'Advanced –> Automatically refresh (if disabled blah blah)' are checked.
I recognize that this is a free product and this bug isn't the end of the world. But it would save me and others brain-context-switching-cycles and minutes every day, and would love to see if we can resolve this for this amazing app.
Garam Song
added a comment - - edited I am on a Mac 10.13.6 with SourceTree 3.0.1 (205), and the issue is that local file changes do not refresh automatically in SourceTree. This actually used to work, until it stopped working out of the blue a few months into using SourceTree every day. I have confirmed that 'General Preferences –> Refresh automatically when files change' and repository settings 'Advanced –> Automatically refresh (if disabled blah blah)' are checked.
I recognize that this is a free product and this bug isn't the end of the world. But it would save me and others brain-context-switching-cycles and minutes every day, and would love to see if we can resolve this for this amazing app. It has been six years (2000 days) and we are still waiting on this bug that affects us many times each day that we use SourceTree. @Kieran, what do we have to do to escalate this to the proper channels?
Garam Song
added a comment - - edited It has been six years (2000 days) and we are still waiting on this bug that affects us many times each day that we use SourceTree. @Kieran, what do we have to do to escalate this to the proper channels? The latest 2.7.6 on Mac still has this problem. While debugging the problem, I realised that the "failure to auto refresh files" only happens if the repository path mentioned in the bookmark contains a symbolic link. Changing the bookmark to use the full / real path to the folder fixes the issue.
I just did a find-replace of all my paths in the "~/Library/Sourcetree/browser.plist" file. I had to convert the file to XML first (using http://osxdaily.com/2016/03/10/convert-plist-file-xml-binary-mac-os-x-plutil/), then I did the find-replace and then converted it back to binary (ensure Sourcetree is not running when making changes to this file).
Issue fixed in 4.2.5. Kindly upgrade the Sourcetree Version and verify.