What are some tips to manage xcode and android studio playing nicely together? At the moment, I'm finding xcode won't recognize files added externally

Yes that is a pain, one gotta go through the add file panel interface 😔 Here to get notified of any advice too

In Xcode, you can create groups or folder references in a project. Groups don't sync with the file system. Folder references do (although the files might not automatically be added to a target build). You can replace the existing groups in the project with folder references instead. Drag the folder from Finder into the Xcode project structure and it'll pop up a dialog. Make sure "folder reference" is selected. Then remove the old group.