Refactor in webstorm is almost completely useless... each time I go to use it asks me to retry as it generated new build files. Even though I'm only trying to refactor the code not the artifacts.... even though I have excluded all output folders and told it to search the src only
It would help a lot if you could send us a sample project. If output/dist folders are excluded from the project (in the Project View, right-click on the folder and select Mark as Excluded), WebStorm should not look for usages or rename anything in them.