> ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://faq.exode.biz/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # Knowledge base and AI assistant > How to upload school documents to the knowledge base, set up access and how the AI assistant answers students and staff based on these documents The knowledge base is a storage for school documents that the AI assistant uses to answer questions. You upload files: regulations, study guides, answers to frequently asked questions. The platform indexes them, and students and staff ask questions in the **Knowledge base** chat. The assistant answers only from the documents the person has access to and links to the source files. > [!WARNING] > > In a corporate school, the knowledge base is available without a separate connection. In a commercial school, it depends on the tariff: until the feature is connected, the section is not visible in the menu. If you try to use it, the **Enable the feature** window appears. Click **Request activation** and write to support: your Exode manager turns the feature on. ## How it works * **Space** — the top level of the knowledge base, for example “Regulations” or “Materials for students”. Each space has its own access settings. * **Folders** — inside a space; they can be nested. * **Files** — the documents the assistant answers from. After upload, each file goes through indexing. * **Chat** — students and staff ask questions, and the assistant looks for the answer in all spaces available to this person. Students do not see files and folders. They see only the chat and get answers with links to documents. ## Who can manage the knowledge base | Permission | What it gives | | - | - | | **Knowledge base management** | Create spaces and folders, upload, rename and delete files, set up access | | **Knowledge base browsing** | View all spaces in the section, even without granted access | | **School settings management** (in a corporate school — **Company settings management**) | Turn on the **Show to students** toggle | Permissions are granted in **My school → Team** (in a corporate school — **Company → Administrators**). Knowledge base permissions appear in the list only when the feature is connected. Learn more in [Access rights](https://faq.exode.biz/en/general/roles-permissions/access-rights.md). ## How to fill the knowledge base **1. Open the section** In the admin panel, choose **Knowledge base** (“Files and documents storage”). **2. Create a space** Click the **Create space** tile, enter a name and click **Create**. The name must be 1 to 100 characters and unique within the school. **3. Create folders (optional)** Inside the space, click **Create folder**. The folder name must be 1 to 100 characters and unique at its level. **4. Upload files** Click **Upload file** or drag files into the window. You can upload up to 10 files at a time. After upload, you see the message “File uploaded, indexing has started”. **5. Wait for indexing** While a file is being processed, the **Indexing** status is shown next to it. When the status disappears, the file is ready: the assistant can answer from it. **6. Set up access** Open the space's **Settings** tab and, in the **Access** section, choose who can get answers from this space. Learn more in the “Access to spaces” section below. **7. Show the section to students** On the main page of the knowledge base, turn on the **Show to students** toggle. Students will see the **Knowledge base** item in their menu. ## Which files the assistant understands You can upload a file of any format, but the assistant answers only from files it could extract text from. | Type | Formats | | - | - | | Text | TXT, MD, CSV, JSON, XML | | Documents | PDF, including scans: the text is recognized automatically | | Office files | DOCX, XLSX, PPTX | | Images | PNG, JPEG, WebP, GIF, BMP, TIFF, HEIC | Older DOC, XLS and PPT formats, archives, video and audio are not indexed. Such files stay in the base but get the **Not indexed** status. For the assistant to answer from them, save the document as DOCX, XLSX, PPTX or PDF and upload it again. ### Indexing statuses | Status | What it means | | - | - | | No status | The file is indexed, and the assistant can answer from it | | **Indexing** | The file is being processed | | **Not indexed** | No text could be extracted from the file: the format is not supported, or the file is empty or too large | | **Indexing failed** | Processing failed | | **Indexing interrupted** | Processing did not finish within 60 minutes | | **Deleting** | The file was deleted and is being removed from the assistant's answers | > [!NOTE] > > If indexing failed (**Indexing failed**, **Indexing interrupted**) or the file could not be downloaded for indexing (**Not indexed** with the hint “The file could not be downloaded for indexing — try again”), start it again: with the button next to the status or the **Retry indexing** item in the file menu. You don't need to delete and re-upload the file, and the link to the file stays the same. This requires the **Knowledge base management** permission. ## Access to spaces You set up access in **Settings → Access** inside the space: * **Available to everyone** — all school users, including students, get answers from the space. * If the toggle is off, only the people you added get access: * **Search by users** — a specific user; * **By department** — all employees of the department and its nested departments (corporate schools only); * **By position** — all employees with the selected position (corporate schools only). Departments and positions are set in the organization structure of a corporate school — see [Organization structure and departments](https://faq.exode.biz/en/corporate/departments.md) and [Positions](https://faq.exode.biz/en/corporate/positions.md). Students get access through **Available to everyone** or individually through user search. > [!WARNING] > > A new space is not open to anyone by default. Until you turn on **Available to everyone** or add people, the assistant will not answer from its files — neither to students nor to staff. Access changes apply to open chats within a few seconds. If an employee is moved to another department or position, their access updates within 5 minutes — after they reopen the chat. ## How the assistant answers * It answers only from the document fragments it found and does not add general knowledge to the answer. * It searches all spaces available to this user. * It puts links to files in the answer and lists the source documents at the end. * If the documents have no answer, it says directly that the knowledge base does not have this and names the spaces it searched. * If documents contradict each other, it names both and points out which one is current. * When asked to “show the document”, it quotes the fragments it found instead of sending the whole file. * It does not perform actions on the platform — it only answers questions. An empty chat has ready-made prompts: “What's in the knowledge base?”, “Summarise the key points of the documents”, “Where should I start with the materials?”. ### Where students ask questions * On a computer — the **Knowledge base** item in the menu. It appears when the **Show to students** toggle is on. * On a phone — the **Ask the knowledge base** button on the **My learning** page. * On a computer, there is an AI helper button in the corner of the screen with a **Knowledge base** tab. All school users see it when the knowledge base is connected, even if the **Show to students** toggle is off. The student still gets answers only from the spaces available to them. ## Space settings Besides access, the space's **Settings** tab has: * **Card settings** — the cover color and the text color of the space tile, separately for the light and dark themes. The **Reset** button restores the default colors. * **Branding** — **Space logo** (shown on the tile) and **Space cover** (becomes the tile background). All changes are saved automatically. ## Exode AI — the assistant for staff Apart from the knowledge base, school staff have the **Exode AI** assistant. On a computer, the **Exode AI** item (“School assistant”) is in the admin panel. The assistant prepares reports, finds students and data, and helps with courses and lessons. * It works with platform data on behalf of the staff member and only within their permissions. * Before changes that affect two or more people, it shows a plan and asks for confirmation. * Through the **Skills** menu in the chat, you can add school rules and skills — instructions the assistant follows in its work. A staff member with the **School settings management** / **Company settings management** permission can create and change them. * It does not depend on whether the knowledge base is connected. ## Rules and limits | What is limited | Value | | - | - | | Nesting | Up to 5 levels, including the space itself. You cannot put a file into a 5th-level folder | | Space name | 1 to 100 characters, unique within the school | | Folder name | 1 to 100 characters, unique at its level | | File name | Up to 120 characters in the interface, the extension does not change | | Files per upload | Up to 10 | | File size for indexing | Files larger than 100 MB are not indexed | | Recognition of scanned PDFs | Up to 500 pages | | Indexing time | If a file is processed for more than 60 minutes, it gets the **Indexing interrupted** status | Knowledge base files are kept in the school's file storage and count toward its size. ## Edge cases * **Deleting a file.** The file immediately gets the **Deleting** status and is removed from the assistant's answers. If removal from the index fails the first time, the platform retries it automatically. Until it is finished, the file may still appear in answers. * **Deleting a folder or space.** All its content is deleted. Before deleting, a window shows the number of items inside. You cannot undo the deletion. The space's access settings are deleted together with it. * **Renaming a file.** The file is not reindexed. For the assistant to use a new version of the document, delete the old file and upload the new one. * **The “Knowledge base browsing” and “Knowledge base management” permissions.** They open all spaces in the management section, but not in the chat. In the chat, a staff member gets answers only from spaces opened to them through **Available to everyone** or granted access. * **A student lost access to a course.** This does not affect the knowledge base: access to spaces is not tied to courses. * **The feature is turned off.** The section disappears from the menu, but the documents are not deleted. ## Frequently asked questions > **Why is there no “Knowledge base” section in the menu?** > > In a commercial school, the feature may not be connected, or you do not have the **Knowledge base management** or **Knowledge base browsing** permission. To connect the feature, write to support — your manager turns it on. > **Why doesn't the assistant answer from an uploaded file?** > > Check three things. The file must be indexed — with no status next to its name. The space must have access set up: a new space is not open to anyone. And the file format must be supported: DOC, XLS, PPT, archives, video and audio are not indexed. > **Students do not see the knowledge base. What should I do?** > > Turn on the **Show to students** toggle on the main page of the knowledge base. Then open access to the spaces you need: turn on **Available to everyone** or add students individually. > **Can I open a space only to students of one course or group?** > > No. Access is given to all school users, specific users, departments or positions. There is no link to courses and groups. > **Do students see the files themselves?** > > No. A student works only with the chat. In its answers, the assistant links to the source documents. > **Can the assistant answer something that is not in the documents?** > > No. The assistant answers only from fragments found in the documents. If there is no answer, it says directly that the knowledge base does not have this. > **What should I do if a file has the “Indexing failed” or “Indexing interrupted” status?** > > Click the retry button next to the status or select **Retry indexing** in the file menu. The file is indexed again, and its link stays the same. > **Why doesn't the search in the section find the answer I need?** > > The search in the section looks only at file names. To find an answer in the content of documents, ask a question in the **Knowledge base** chat. > **Can I move a file to another folder?** > > No, the interface has no moving. Delete the file and upload it to the folder you need. > **What is the maximum file size?** > > The upload size is not limited, but files larger than 100 MB are not indexed, and the assistant does not answer from them. It is better to split large documents into parts. > **A staff member has the “Knowledge base browsing” permission, but the assistant does not answer them from a space. Why?** > > This permission opens spaces only in the management section. For the assistant to answer this staff member, turn on **Available to everyone** for the space or give access to this staff member, their department or their position. *** *Updated: 2026-10-17 07:07 UTC* This documentation is built and hosted on [Mintlify](https://mintlify.com), a developer documentation platform.