Refresh explorer doesn't work when explorer is moved

[dacapoday]

Does this issue occur when all extensions are disabled?: Yes

Version: 1.84.2 (user setup)
Commit: 1a5daa3
Date: 2023-11-09T10:51:52.184Z
Electron: 25.9.2
ElectronBuildId: 24603566
Chromium: 114.0.5735.289
Node.js: 18.15.0
V8: 11.4.183.29-electron.0
OS: Windows_NT x64 10.0.19045

Steps to Reproduce:

also causes Refresh Explorer to fail.

Related issues:
#197301

Workarround:

• call View: Reset View Locations

[lramos15]

I cannot reproduce, so you just move views around a bunch until the explorer disappears? Do you have any extension?

[dacapoday]

I cannot reproduce, so you just move views around a bunch until the explorer disappears? Do you have any extension?

Yes, Make Folders appear independently and move Explorer into Folders. I expect view back to Explorer include Folders instead of Explorer eventually disappearing.
Explorer disappearing can cause other problems, including but not limited to Refresh Explorer fail. File: Focus on Files Explorer fail.

As I said at the beginning:

Does this issue occur when all extensions are disabled?: Yes

I can even reproduce it in a completely fresh installation of the macOS version of vscode without any extensions installed.

[lramos15]

Okay so I can see that refresh explorer doesn't work in this case, that's for sure. I cannot get folders to completely disappear

[dacapoday]

Okay so I can see that refresh explorer doesn't work in this case, that's for sure. I cannot get folders to completely disappear

In fact, what disappeared was the label Explorer. After the move, Its position is replaced by Folders. The folder tree itself is not affected. As shown in the picture, the MOVIES folder contents can still be browsed, but its label(or button anyway) in activity bar is from EXPLORER:MOVIES to FOLDERS:MOVIES.
The view hierarchy relationship changes from:

• Explorer
  • Folders
  • Open editors
  • timeline
  • outline

to:

• Folders
  • Open editors
  • timeline
  • outline

The ability to browse folders itself is not affected, but those commands bound to or target to Explorer will be invalid.
This is also the root cause of #197301 .

[lramos15]

It's going to be confusion but "Explorer" is actually the container while "Folders" is what we call the view. So when you move Folders out of the explorer it creates its own container called "Folders" and this is working as intended.

#197301 is a different root cause, but there's definitely a bug here around refresh and other explorer commands. Thanks for the find!

[lramos15]

To verify:

1. Move the folder view (the file tree structure) somewhere else separate from the explorer view container
2. Hit refresh explorer

You should stay on the folder view and not be moved to a different view container. You should also see the refresh properly occur.