Knowledge bases

A knowledge base is a collection of documents that Genie searches and cites when people ask questions: policies, procedures, price lists, manuals. Use this page to create knowledge bases, fill them with documents, keep them organised and current, and share them with other workspaces. Every member of a workspace can open all of its knowledge bases; document permissions decide which documents inside each one a person sees. Contributors create knowledge bases and manage the ones they created; Admins and Owners manage every knowledge base in the workspace.

Who can do what

On these pages, the knowledge base admins are the knowledge base's creator and the workspace's Admins and Owners.

Task	Viewer	Contributor	Admin, Owner
Open knowledge bases, browse and search the documents they may see, ask questions	✓	✓	✓
Create a knowledge base	–	✓	✓
Upload, edit, tag, move and delete documents; change settings; share; restrict documents	–	Knowledge bases they created	Every knowledge base
Download original files	–	✓	✓

Create a knowledge base

To create a knowledge base:

1. Click Knowledge in the sidebar, then Create knowledge base.

2. Under Knowledge Base Type, choose:

   • Document-based for files, web pages and pages written in Genie. This is the right choice for almost everything.
   • FAQ Q&A for a list of questions with approved answers, such as a customer FAQ. You add or import the entries in the knowledge base afterwards.

   The type cannot be changed later.

3. Under Indexing Strategy, keep RAG Search ticked: it lets Genie find passages in the documents and answer from them. Also tick Wiki Knowledge Base if you want Genie to write linked topic pages from the documents (see Wiki and graph views). Decide now: once the knowledge base holds documents, these choices are locked.

4. Enter a Knowledge Base Name (up to 50 characters), for example Human resources.

5. Enter a Knowledge Base Description (up to 200 characters) that says what is inside, for example Leave, allowances, expenses and the employee handbook for all Contoso branches. Genie reads the description to decide which knowledge base fits a question, so a clear description gives better answers.

6. Optional, in the menu on the left of the dialog: choose the sensitivity level under Data protection (see Sensitivity), and set up Metadata filters and Approval & retention.

7. Click Create Knowledge Base. The dialog stays open so you can keep adjusting settings. Click Save and Close when you are done.

Screenshot coming soonCreating the Human resources knowledge basewebsite-docs/public/screenshots/en/kb-create.png

Creating the Human resources knowledge base

To change the settings later, open the knowledge base and click the Settings tab. The dialog is then called Knowledge Base Settings.

The other sections of the dialog

Most sections come filled in with your workspace's defaults. What each one changes for users:

Section	What it does
Model Configuration	The models that read the documents: Embedding Model for search and LLM Model for summaries. The default models are filled in. If Genie asks you to pick one, choose among the models your system administrator set up (see Models and data protection). Once the knowledge base holds documents, switch to another embedding model with Change embedding model, then Start re-embedding: Genie re-processes the documents in the background and search keeps working until it switches over. Citations in older conversations that point to the old passages stop opening.
Image Processing	Turn on Multimodal Feature so Genie can read text, tables and charts in images and scanned pages. Needs a vision model.
Audio	Turn on Enable audio speech recognition so recordings and videos are transcribed and become searchable. Needs a speech model.
Knowledge Graph	See Knowledge graph.
Advanced Settings	Includes Expired documents in answers (see Expiry dates).
Metadata filters	See Metadata fields and filters.
Approval & retention	See Approval before publishing and Retention.
Data protection	The sensitivity level. See Sensitivity.
Data Sources	Sync SharePoint, OneDrive, Teams, file servers, mailboxes or websites into the knowledge base. See Data sources. Shown after the knowledge base is created.
Sharing	See Share with other workspaces. Shown after creation.
Genie routing	How the default assistant decides to search this knowledge base. See Agents and the default assistant. Shown after creation.
Activity	A log of every change to the knowledge base, its documents, sharing and access. Shown after creation, to knowledge base admins.
Vector Store, Storage Engine, Chunking Settings	Technical choices about how documents are split and stored. Leave them as they are unless your Genie provider asks you to change them; some cannot be changed once the knowledge base holds documents. The vector databases and storage offered here are set up by a system administrator, on Vector database and Storage in the System administration group of Settings. If you follow their link to Settings without being a system administrator, Genie tells you to ask one.

Upload documents

To add documents:

1. Open the knowledge base from Knowledge.

2. Click Upload and choose:

   • Upload Document for one or more files.
   • Upload Folder for a whole folder. Its sub-folders become folders in the knowledge base.
   • Import from URL for one web page, by its address.
   • Online Edit to write a page directly in Genie. It becomes searchable when you choose Publish and parse; until then it is a Draft.

   You can also drag files onto the page.

3. In Confirm Upload, check the Upload location (the folder the files go into), pick Document tags if you want, and leave Generate document summaries on. Click Upload and parse.

4. The Uploads panel at the bottom right follows each file. Keep the page open until the files are uploaded. After that, processing continues in the background and you can leave the page.

Screenshot coming soonThe Uploads panel shows which files are already searchablewebsite-docs/public/screenshots/en/kb-upload.png

The Uploads panel shows which files are already searchable

File types and size:

• The upload area lists what is accepted: PDF, Word, Excel and PowerPoint files, text, Markdown, CSV and saved web pages, each up to 300 MB unless your Genie provider set another limit. The exact list for a knowledge base is under Accepted formats: click the info icon next to the knowledge base's name (View knowledge base info).
• Images (JPG, PNG) need Image Processing, and audio (MP3, WAV, M4A…) and video (MP4, MOV, MKV, WebM) need Audio. Confirm Upload shows Needs setup when they are off.
• A file identical to one already in the knowledge base is skipped and shown as Already exists.
• To keep a SharePoint library, Teams channel, file server share, mailbox or website in sync instead of uploading by hand, connect it as a data source.

Replace a document with a new version

When a policy changes, upload the new file onto the existing document instead of deleting it. The document keeps its tags, folder and permissions, and links to it in past answers keep working.

1. In the document list, open the document's ⋯ menu and choose Upload new version.
2. Click Choose file, add a Change note if useful, and click Upload.

Answers keep using the current file until the new one has been processed. The Versions section of the document lists the earlier files; Restore makes one current again.

Folders and tags

Folders and tags organise documents. Both can also be used to restrict who sees a group of documents.

• Folders: a document lives in one folder. A knowledge base gets folders when you upload a folder or move documents into a new folder. The Folders tree on the left appears as soon as there is a folder.
• Tags: labels across folders. A document can carry several tags, for example Policy and Da Nang.

To move documents into a folder:

1. Click Select documents and tick the documents. For a single document, use its ⋯ menu instead.
2. Choose Move to folder, then pick a folder, or choose New sub-folder to create one.

Moving a document between folders does not process it again. To rename a folder, click ⋯ next to it in the Folders tree and choose Rename. Renaming a folder to the name of an existing folder merges the two.

To tag documents:

• One document: click Add tags on its row or card, type in Search or create a tag to pick a tag or create a new one, and save.
• Several documents: click Select documents, tick them, then Batch Tag. The tags you set replace the ones the documents had.
• While uploading: pick Document tags in Confirm Upload.

To list documents by tag, open Filters above the list and tick tags under Tag: the list shows documents that carry any of them. A tag still used by documents cannot be deleted; remove it from the documents first.

Document processing status

After upload, Genie reads each document, splits it into passages and indexes them. The status on each row or card tells you whether people can already get answers from it:

Status	What it means for users
Processing	Genie is reading the document. It is not used in answers yet.
Generating summary..., Optimizing	The document is already searchable. Genie is still adding its summary and other extras.
Completed	Searchable and used in answers.
Queued	No progress for 20 minutes because many documents are waiting. It continues on its own.
May be stuck	No progress for 20 minutes and nothing is working on it. Stop it and rebuild it (below). If it stays stuck, it is marked Failed automatically.
Failed	Not searchable. Retry it as described below.
Cancelled	Someone chose Stop parsing. Rebuild the document to process it completely.
Draft	A page written with Online Edit and not published yet. Not searchable.

Screenshot coming soonDocuments of the Human resources knowledge base with their status, tags and folderswebsite-docs/public/screenshots/en/kb-documents.png

Documents of the Human resources knowledge base with their status, tags and folders

To retry a failed document:

1. Open the document's ⋯ menu and choose Rebuild Document. For several documents, click Select documents, tick them and choose Rebuild Document in the bar at the bottom.
2. To see why it failed, choose View trace in the same menu. The panel names the step that failed and the reason, and offers Retry parsing. Copy error details copies the reason so you can send it to your Genie provider if the document keeps failing.

Files that failed to upload can be retried with Retry in the Uploads panel. To find every failed document, open Filters and choose Failed under Status. A banner saying that some document types "have no available parser engine" means those files cannot be processed in this knowledge base; ask your Genie provider.

Metadata fields and filters

When one knowledge base holds documents for several branches, years or document types, metadata fields let people (and Genie) search only the documents that match. Example at Contoso: a Branch field with the values Hanoi, Da Nang and Ho Chi Minh City.

To define the fields (knowledge base admins):

1. Open the knowledge base's Settings → Metadata filters.
2. Click Add field and fill in:
   • the label people see, for example Branch;
   • the key the value is stored under, for example branch (a letter first, then letters, digits and _);
   • the type: List of values, Year, Text, Number or Date. For a list, enter one value per line, with other spellings after =, for example Ho Chi Minh City = HCMC, Saigon.
3. Choose the options:
   • Read filters from the question: a question that names a value, such as "leave policy in Da Nang", is filtered on it automatically.
   • Keep documents without a value: documents that have no value for the field stay in the results, for example policies that apply to every branch.
4. Click Save and Close.

To give documents their values:

• One document: open it. The fields appear under Custom metadata.
• Several documents: click Select documents, tick them, then Set metadata. Fields left on Keep current values are not touched; Clear removes a value.
• Many documents: in Metadata filters → Values in bulk, click Download CSV, fill in the file in Excel, then Import CSV. An empty cell keeps the value and - clears it.

People then see a Filter button next to the knowledge base picker in chat, and each answer shows the filters it applied. Filters only narrow what a person may already read; they never give access to more. A knowledge base can have up to 20 fields, and a list up to 200 values.

Approval before publishing

Use approval when documents must be checked before Genie quotes them, for example HR policies or price lists.

To require approval (knowledge base admins):

1. Open the knowledge base's Settings → Approval & retention.
2. Turn on Require approval before documents are used in answers.
3. Under Approvers, choose Knowledge base admins, or Selected members and pick people, for example Thu Hoang. Named approvers do not need edit rights on the knowledge base. When you name members, only they can approve.
4. Documents synced from a data source are not held by default, because the source system has its own approvals. Turn on Also require approval for synced documents to hold them too.
5. Click Save and Close.

What changes for users:

• A new document is processed as usual, but it is not used in answers, search or agents until it is approved. It is marked Awaiting approval.
• A new version of an approved document waits next to it, marked New version awaiting approval. The approved version keeps answering in the meantime.
• A rejected document is marked Not approved and stays out of answers. Uploading a corrected file as a new version submits it again.

To approve or reject:

1. Open the knowledge base and click Approvals above the document list. The number shows how many documents are waiting.
2. Open a request. For a new version, Changes shows what changed compared with the approved text, and New version shows the full text.
3. Click Approve (a comment is optional) or Reject (a comment is required; the person who submitted the document sees it).

When outgoing email is set up, approvers get an email when documents start waiting, and the submitter gets one when their document is decided.

Retention: expiry, trash and legal hold

Expiry dates

A document can carry an expiry date, for example a price list valid until the end of the quarter.

1. Click the document to open it. Under Ownership and review, click Edit.
2. Set Expires on (and Effective from if useful), then save.

On that date the document's status becomes Expired. Expired documents are left out of answers, so Genie does not quote an outdated policy. To keep them as a last resort instead, open Settings → Advanced Settings → Expired documents in answers and choose Keep, ranked below documents in force.

The same section names the document's Owner and how often it should be checked (Review every). When the review date passes, the document is marked Review due and a Needs review button appears above the list; Mark reviewed records the check and schedules the next one. When outgoing email is set up, owners also get an email listing their documents that are due or expired.

Delete documents automatically

To have old documents removed (knowledge base admins):

1. Open the knowledge base's Settings → Approval & retention, section Automatic deletion.
2. Under Delete expired documents, choose Platform default, Never, or After a number of days and enter how many days after the expiry date.
3. To also remove documents nobody has updated for a long time, turn on Delete documents not updated for and enter a number of months. Only a new file version or an edit counts as an update.
4. Click Preview the next run to see which documents these values would delete, before you save.
5. Click Save and Close.

Once a day, Genie moves the matching documents to the knowledge base's trash. They disappear from lists, search and answers at once, but can be restored for 30 days. A system administrator can change that period in Settings → System settings → Security & privacy. After it, the documents are deleted permanently.

Some documents are never deleted automatically: documents under legal hold, documents still processing, documents waiting for approval, and documents synced from a data source (they follow their source; delete them there).

To get a document back, click Trash above the document list (it appears when the trash holds documents), then Restore. A restored document is not deleted again for one full retention period. Delete now deletes a trashed document permanently at once.

Legal hold

To keep a document whatever happens, for example during a tax audit:

1. Click the document to open it.
2. Under Approval and legal hold, click Set legal hold and enter the reason.

A document under Legal hold is never deleted by retention rules and cannot be deleted by anyone, and the knowledge base cannot be deleted while it holds one. Release hold removes the hold.

Wiki and graph views

The Wiki turns the documents into linked topic pages: one page per person, product, policy or idea, each citing the documents it comes from. People browse it like an intranet wiki, and Genie uses the pages for questions that span many documents.

To turn on the Wiki:

1. When you create the knowledge base, tick Wiki Knowledge Base under Indexing Strategy. The choice is locked once the knowledge base holds documents; to add a Wiki later, create a new knowledge base with the Wiki on and upload the documents there.
2. Optional: choose the Extraction Granularity: Focused (main subjects only), Standard (recommended) or Exhaustive (every named thing, useful for a glossary). Wiki Content Instructions and Wiki Extraction Focus steer the tone and what to emphasise, for example "focus on products, branches and owners".
3. Upload documents. While pages are being written, the Wiki tab shows "indexing".

A knowledge base with the Wiki has these tabs:

Tab	What people see
Documents	The document list.
Wiki	The topic pages, their links and sources. Knowledge base admins can Edit a page, and bring back an earlier version with History → Revert to this version.
Graph	A map of the links between Wiki pages. Click a node to open its page.
Gallery	Every image found in the documents. Every document knowledge base has this tab.

Wiki pages follow document permissions: a page built from a document someone may not see is hidden from them. Writing the Wiki uses extra model calls while documents are processed, which shows in usage and cost.

Knowledge graph

The knowledge graph is different from the Graph tab. With it, Genie extracts people, organisations, products and how they relate from the documents, to answer relationship questions better. People do not browse it; it works behind the answers.

To turn it on, open Settings → Knowledge Graph and turn on Enable Entity-Relationship Extraction. It is available only when your Genie provider has enabled it; otherwise the section says that the knowledge graph database is not enabled.

Share with other workspaces

Inside the workspace, every member already sees every knowledge base. To share one with other workspaces, use a Shared space (see Shared spaces):

1. Open the knowledge base's Settings → Sharing.
2. Click + (Share). Under Select shared space, choose the space.
3. Under Permission, choose Read-only (search and ask) or Editable (also change the documents).
4. Optional: set Share ends on to make the share temporary.
5. Click Share.

Members of the workspaces in that space find the knowledge base under Knowledge → Shared with me. To share down to the workspaces below yours, choose the space marked Child workspaces; it is always read-only. To stop sharing, click Remove share.

The knowledge base's creator, Admins and Owners can share it, into a shared space where your workspace has at least an editing role. Who sees what in a shared knowledge base, and how document permissions apply to people from other workspaces, is explained in Document permissions.

Good to know

• Deleting a document by hand (Delete Document) is immediate and permanent. Only documents removed by retention rules go to the trash.
• Delete in a knowledge base's menu in the list deletes the knowledge base and all its documents. It cannot be undone.
• Duplicate in the same menu creates a new knowledge base with the same settings, but without documents, sharing or document permissions.
• A knowledge base marked Needs setup is missing a model. Open its settings and complete Model Configuration before uploading.
• FAQ knowledge bases have no folders, metadata filters, approval, retention or per-entry restrictions.
• Turning approval off does not publish the documents that are waiting: decide them in Approvals first. Approvers see every request; other members see only their own submissions. An approver may approve their own upload, and the Activity log says so.
• With the knowledge graph turned on, people, products and relations from documents that are still waiting for approval can already reach Genie's graph search. Keep the knowledge graph off in knowledge bases that require approval.
• Documents count towards your workspace's storage. Settings → Workspace info shows how much is used.
• How long conversations are kept is a separate setting: see Privacy and retention.

Related pages

• Data sources
• Document permissions
• Models and data protection
• Agents and the default assistant
• Usage, analytics and audit
• Ask your documents (user guide)