From a WebDAV or Chwala or filesystem or (...) resource location, an initial synchronization copies off metadata (of files and folders) -- not payload -- this allows the interface to generate lists for folders and files (available for sessions).

The creation of a session against a document would copy off the data to Manticore, so that operations and snapshots can be created, until such time the document is (automatically? upon the user's request?) saved off to the canonical location of the original file.