reboot needed to refresh MTP list? using Terminal Emulator I created a file;

cd /storage/emulated/0/Downloaded
echo test &gt; test.txt


Then using Android File Transfer I can see files in the same dir but not the test file. ls -l indicated it's not a chown chmod issue;

-rw-rw---- root    sdcard_r      3323 2016-02-22 15:15 other.txt
-rw-rw---- root    sdcard_r         5 2016-02-22 15:15 test.txt


sync, repluging, killing the client, and changing to PTP then back to MTP did not help but a reboot did so what's up with that?
While I do not have an answer for this strange behaviour (which I'm experiencing as well), I can say that a whole reboot may be skipped. In most cases, in fact, renaming the file you wish to transfer will make it visible on your PC as well. Additionally, if you wish to embark in the journey of installing adb on a Mac, you'll find that:

adb pull "android_file_path" "path_to_copy_the_file_to"


will be able to copy the desired file to your computer, regardless of it being visible on Android File Transfer or not.