Tips & Tidbits We've collected
The Sync Folder on your computer:
If someone shares a document or folder with you, it will only appear online and not in your sync folder.**
If you own a document or folder and share it with someone, it will still appear in your sync folder.
**However, if you wish to have access to a folder or documents that someone shares with you, you can sync the folder. However, you have to have "edit" rights to that folder to sync it. How do you know if you have edit rights?
After syncing this folder, it will appear in a different location from your other documents in your sync folder. The will be located in a folder called "sharepoint."
Interestingly, it will actually sync any folders that you have in common with the person who is sharing. In other words, when I completed this sync with the World History folder - it synced the Library folder too. Even though I didn't have "edit" rights with that folder.
It does seem to sync nicely back and forth when making edits. One caution - if you don't have edit rights to a document , when you view it on your desktop, it will let you edit anyway. Of course, those edits won't sync with the cloud version AND it will cause a sync error. This may cause other items not to sync. So, I would only edit documents that you have edit rights for.
To be on the safe side, when dealing with folders and documents that are "shared with you," just use the web interface.