I switched to skydrive from dropbox after buying Lumia. Dropbox never required to download software. It was entirely optional. Maybe try from another browser? Compatibility problems may be causing that.
Now that the boss of the project has shared his folder with me, I can upload files via the website to that folder, as well as create new folders on there. So, it seems like it had to be triggered somehow first. That said, if I go to the Pictures area I cannot upload pictures via the website; it's still begging me to download the app. As much as possible I want to avoid doing that as I have no interest in using Dropbox once this project is over: then it's back to SkyDrive for good.
My problem with SkyDrive is that I have to manually set sharing permission to each file, instead of making a shared folder (whatever is in that is automatically shared). I know there is a folder link and all, but I don't want to share an entire folder, just each file.
I'm confused: first you lament that you have to share each file individually instead of making a shared folder, and then you lament that you can share an entire folder but you don't want to share an entire folder, just each file.
You can share individual files or you can share folders (and thus, all of the files in a folder). You can do both, so regardless of what you were lamenting about, I think you can do it.