Ask questions and get answers from your own documents

An AI assistant searches your uploaded documents and spreadsheets to answer questions accurately, citing the right source.

How the work actually flows

It branches. Exactly one path is taken.

Pattern: Exclusive Choice (4) · Simple Merge (5)

flowchart TD trig(("user asks a question")):::human s0[("index uploaded documents")]:::store s1["receive user question"]:::task s2["choose retrieval method"]:::task s3["return answer with sources"]:::task trig --> s0 s0 --> s1 s1 --> s2 gx{"× how to find the answer"}:::gate s2 --> gx p00["retrieve matching passages"]:::task gx -->|"search documents"| p00 p10["compute result from spreadsheet"]:::task gx -->|"run calculation"| p10 p20["retrieve whole file"]:::task gx -->|"pull full document"| p20 jn{"○ return answer"}:::gate p00 --> jn p10 --> jn p20 --> jn jn --> s3 out[/"accurate answer with sources"/]:::out pay{{"faster access to company knowledge"}}:::pay s3 --> out out --> pay classDef task fill:#e7f6fe,stroke:#34b8f0,color:#2c2a29 classDef svc fill:#f6f8fa,stroke:#7c8795,color:#2c2a29 classDef mi fill:#e7f6fe,stroke:#0079a8,color:#2c2a29,stroke-width:2px classDef human fill:#fff,stroke:#0079a8,color:#0079a8 classDef store fill:#f6f8fa,stroke:#0079a8,color:#2c2a29 classDef trig fill:#00a4eb,stroke:#0079a8,color:#fff,font-weight:bold classDef trigtime fill:#00a4eb,stroke:#0079a8,color:#fff,font-weight:bold classDef trigdata fill:#8ad4f5,stroke:#0079a8,color:#06314c,font-weight:bold classDef gate fill:#fff,stroke:#e8a23d,color:#6b4708,font-weight:bold classDef out fill:#1f9d6b,stroke:#167a53,color:#fff,font-weight:bold classDef pay fill:#06314c,stroke:#021f33,color:#fff
A stepA personA record or sheetOne path onlyPaths rejoinResultPayoff
Build size
Advanced

A larger build with multiple systems, AI reasoning, and custom rules.

Business functions
AI Agents & Autonomous SystemsAI Chatbots & AssistantsKnowledge Base & RAGDocument Processing & OCR
Connects
OllamaOpenAIPostgreSQL

The problem it solves

Your team's knowledge is scattered across contracts, reports, and spreadsheets, and finding one specific fact means digging through files by hand. Simple questions take far longer to answer than they should.

Who it fits

Teams with a large internal library of documents and spreadsheets who need fast, accurate answers.

How it works

  1. You upload your documents and spreadsheets to a shared folder
  2. The system reads and indexes the content automatically
  3. You ask a question in plain English
  4. The AI assistant decides whether to search the documents, run a calculation, or pull a full document, and finds the answer
  5. It gives you an answer along with the supporting details
What you get

Answers pulled straight from your files

You can ask plain English questions and get answers drawn directly from your own documents and spreadsheets.

What you get

A direct, accurate answer to your question, pulled from your own documents and data.

What you need

A self-hosted AI setup running Ollama, an OpenAI API key, and a PostgreSQL database.

We can build this. But should you?

The hard question is not how to build it. It is whether this is the right thing to build first.

That is what a Fractional Chief AI Officer figures out with you, before anyone writes a line of code.

Let's Talk Strategy

Related automations

Back to the AI Playbook