Standard file/directory operations (create/read/write, etc.) can be achieved transparently using the Win32 API. That's the whole point of this technology.

So, you can create a placeholder using the standard Win32 APIs.

If you create a file or directory in a "sync root" (like in the OneDrive folder hierarchy in the OneDrive case), the associated sync engine process (like OneDrive.exe) will ensure the file or directory is a placeholder. And you can't create a placeholder outside of a sync root hierarchy, AFAIK.

For a file (you can't hydrate or dehydrate a directory), reading/writing correspond to hydration. Note that some sync engines (and/or depending on their configuration) can decide to always fully hydrate a file even if only some bytes were asked by the end-user API (applications).

There are some specific Win32 APIs though for special operations.

You can dehydrate a file using CfDehydratePlaceholder. You can hydrate a file CfHydratePlaceholder. For all the Cloud Filter API, when creating directory handles, don't forget to use the FILE_FLAG_BACKUP_SEMANTICS flags.