Indexing Documents
Uploaded documents can have their text extracted and stored, so the contents are searchable rather than only the filename.
Where to find it
Architect Panel → Data:
- Documents — the documents themselves
Architect Panel → Configuration:
- Site Settings — the File Uploads and Audio/Video Conversion groups
What is recorded
For each document and version: the extracted text, how many characters and pages it produced, which extractor was used, the state of the extraction, any error, and when it happened.
So an extraction is a tracked operation rather than a side effect, and you can tell the difference between a document with no text and one that failed.
A missing extractor refuses rather than pretends
The important behaviour. Text extraction depends on libraries, and where the one needed for a format is not installed the platform says so instead of extracting nothing and reporting success.
That distinction is the whole point: indexing an empty string and calling it done leaves a document that is permanently unfindable and looks indexed.
Character and page counts are the health check
A hundred-page document that extracted forty characters did not extract properly. The counts tell you that immediately, and nothing else does — the document appears indexed and simply never matches a search.
Indexing is a search feature, not a storage one
The document is stored either way. Indexing decides whether somebody can find it by its contents, which for a document library is most of its value.
It has a cost
Extracted text is stored alongside the document, so a large library roughly doubles in one sense. For most organisations that is worth it; for a very large archive of files nobody searches, it may not be.
Extracted text is the document’s content
Which means it carries the same sensitivity. A contract’s extracted text is the contract, and permissions on searching should reflect permissions on reading.
A search that returns snippets is a search that discloses content.
Re-index after a version
Extraction is per version, so a replaced document needs extracting again. A search matching the previous version’s text is a subtle and confusing failure.
Check a sample
Upload one of each format you expect, search for a phrase from the middle of each, and confirm it is found. That is the only proof indexing works for your actual documents.
Worked example
An organisation indexes its contract library and checks character counts after bulk uploads. A batch showing near-zero counts turned out to be scanned images rather than text documents, which needed a different extractor — visible immediately rather than discovered by a failed search months later.
Recommendations
- Check character and page counts after bulk uploads.
- Treat extracted text as the content for permissions.
- Re-index new versions.
- Test a search per format you accept.