On Windows hosts with NTFS last-access updates enabled (fsutil behavior
DisableLastAccess 0/2), every read of a file under src/ updates its
last-access time, and recursive fs.watch reports that as a change event.
The dev server then reloaded the page for any non-bundled path: fonts,
styles, images and other static assets fetched by the page itself.
Each reload fetched those assets again, producing a reload -> fetch ->
last-access -> reload feedback loop where any UI interaction kept
refreshing the page.
Two guards in handleFrontendChange:
- Directory-level change events arrive with a null filename and cannot
identify a reloadable file; ignore them instead of reloading.
- A last-access update never changes mtime, so a change event whose
mtime is far in the past is read noise, not an edit. Only reload for
files written within the last 30 seconds. Trade-off: writers that
deliberately preserve mtime no longer trigger a reload.
Verified on Windows (DisableLastAccess=2): two rounds of fetching 12
static assets produced zero reload events (previously 8 in one round),
while a real file write still triggered exactly one reload.
