Does intellij mess with file cache or something?

I am not so experienced with intellij, so working with it can sometimes be very confusing. I downloaded some project from github using the import existing project feature. The program edits some files and then exports them. The original creator left the unfinished program in debug state with a bunch of code that shouldn't really be there. The problem is that the first time I exported something with the program, it worked. But since then it no longer actually writes to the export location. I'm wondering if intellij does something to maintain files to their state they were when the ide starts up. Something to do with file synchronisation. Could someone tell me more about that? PS Its written in kotlin