Is access to resources on a network automatically synchronized?

The answer by Philippe is perfectly correct. I just want to add an explanation.

Let's see what happens if you use the synchronization primitives you mentioned in the question. They can synchronize threads at the level of just one process, or you can use their named forms which makes them system-wide. It mean you can use them to synchronize threads on the whole system even if they are in different threads, by still in the same computer.

If you use those synchronization primitives and access a network file from just one computer using those synchronization primitives, everything will work. But who will guarantee that the same file are not used by some other computer, the one hosting the file or another remote client? Those computers has nothing to do with synchronization primitives on other computer — synchronization (for example interlocking of access to a file) will not work in this case.

You can use some network service which provided access to files for several client. As the service can synchronize access to the files on its (single) computer, this synchronization schema will work.

—SA

Gbenbam wrote:

Can my application read from and write to files freely in a remote shared folder?
Can my application create files in a remote shared folder?

Yes, if your application has sufficient rights to do so. You could either setup the system to run as a specified user (eg "run as" or have it running as a windows service), or use impersonation[^] to impersonate a user credential to access the drive.