9. An authoring environment implemented on a first computing device to enable coauthoring of a document among users, the first computing device being configured to communicate with at least a storage device, the collaborative authoring environment comprising: a. cache configured to store a base copy of the document, a download copy of the document, an upload copy of the document, a working copy of the document, and a lock table; b. an authoring application configured to manipulate the working copy of the document including manipulating content of the working copy and manipulating metadata of the working copy; c. a layer object that provides an interface between the authoring application and the cache, the layer object being configured to update the lock table stored within the cache automatically with updated metadata when the authoring application manipulates the metadata of the working copy, the layer object also being configured to generate the upload copy of the document based on the working copy of the document when instructions to generate the upload copy are received from the authoring application, wherein the upload copy includes content updates obtained from the download copy of the document; and d. a sync manager configured to manage interactions between the cache and the storage device, the sync manager being configured to push the updated metadata from the lock table to the storage device automatically and being configured to push the upload copy of the document from the cache to the storage device when instructions to provide the updates to the content are received from the authoring application, the sync manager configured to obtain any updated download copy periodically from the storage device and to store the updated download copy within the cache of the first computing device, the updated download copy including content updates generated by other users, wherein, the authoring application is configured to receive instructions from a user of the authoring application to view any content updates contained in the updated download copy, the instructions including a user selection, the authoring application configured to display the content updates based on the user selection included in the instructions, the user selection determining whether the content updates are to be annotated on the working copy of the document or whether the content updates are to be merged into the working copy of the document, and wherein the authoring application provides alerts indicating an updated download copy is available for viewing at the first computing device.
10. The authoring environment of claim 9 , wherein the authoring application includes a word processing application.