Setting Up and Managing the Knowledge Base

With the knowledge base, a school organization centrally provides reliable information. Administrators can publish links and knowledge documents. Published knowledge documents are also automatically searched when their content is relevant to a regular chat question.

You manage the knowledge base via Management → Knowledge Base. Existing links and central knowledge documents are listed together in one table.

What Users See

Published items are visible in the Knowledge Base: knowledge for the entire board under School Board → Documents, knowledge for one or more schools under that school → Documents, and links under Links. Depending on the setup, knowledge base links can also appear on the dashboard. Users only see information for the entire organization or for their own school. Document templates intended for certain departments also appear for employees of those departments under school → My Departments.

A knowledge document can be used in two ways:

1. The user opens the document from Documents.
2. AI-School automatically searches the document for a relevant chat question, without the user having to select it with the paperclip.

A regular Link only refers to a webpage, video, or external source. Only a processed knowledge document contains canonical Markdown that can be searched as a central chat source.

Organization and School Level

Each knowledge document has a scope:

• Entire organization — available to all schools within the environment.
• Selected schools — only available to users of one or more selected schools.

Board administrators can manage organization-wide knowledge and knowledge for selected schools. School administrators only manage knowledge for the schools for which they have management rights.

Choose the scope based on the content. For example, a board-wide information security policy belongs to Entire organization; a local accessibility instruction belongs to the relevant school.

The Knowledge Base Overview

In the overview you can:

• search and filter;
• add items with the plus button;
• adjust the order with the drag handle;
• edit links and knowledge documents;
• publish, archive, or delete documents;
• import or export an OKF bundle.

The index and set order determine how items are ranked in Documents.

Adding an Item

Click the plus button above the table. You can choose from three types of content.

Link

Choose Link for an existing webpage, video, course, or other external source. Fill in a recognizable title, description, category, and URL. The link becomes visible in the knowledge base, but the external page is not automatically indexed as a central knowledge document.

Add Document

Choose Add Document to write a knowledge document directly.

1. Enter a unique filename and clear title.
2. Choose a type and add a description and tags.
3. Write or paste the content in the Markdown editor.
4. Choose the status and scope.
5. Save the document.

Use clear headings, short standalone paragraphs, and consistent terms. This helps both the reader and the automatic retrieval of relevant fragments.

Add Source File

Choose Add Source File to use a file from File Management as a knowledge document. You can select an existing file or upload a new file first.

AI-School stores the original file and also creates canonical Markdown. PDF, Word, PowerPoint, Markdown, and other supported files thus get one consistent format for display, export, and search indexing.

PDF, Word, and PowerPoint files are processed automatically. This includes text, document structure, and where possible relevant visual information such as tables, charts, forms, and images. This preserves more usable content than plain text extraction alone.

Before publishing, check:

• whether all important chapters are present;
• whether tables and lists are understandable;
• whether charts and images are well described in terms of content;
• whether title, description, type, and tags are correct;
• whether quality warnings require action;
• whether status and school scope are correct.

Check the source file

A technically successful processing does not guarantee that all visual meaning has been correctly transferred. Always compare important knowledge with the original file.

Setting Metadata

In Set Knowledge Document you manage, among other things:

Field	Use
Title	Name that users see in the knowledge base and source reference.
Type	Content type, for example policy, protocol, or manual.
Description	Short explanation of purpose and content.
Tags	Search and management terms, separated by commas.
Source or resource	Origin or content owner.
Source URL	Link to the original or current source.
Modification date	Date when the source was last updated.
Publication status	Draft, Published, or Archived.
Scope	Entire organization or selected schools.
Share with	Staff, students, or both.
Departments	Only for school knowledge: the departments for which the document is intended.
Canonical Markdown	Content that is displayed, exported, and indexed.

Sharing with Staff, Students, and Departments

With Share with you determine who sees a published document in the Knowledge Base and who receives it as a source in chat: staff, students, or both. A new document is by default shared only with staff. Documents that existed before this setting was introduced remain shared with everyone until you adjust them.

For knowledge for selected schools, you can also choose Departments. You select from the departments set up for the school (Management → Schools). Only staff of those departments then see the document, under school → Documents and also under school → My Departments. If you leave the field empty, the document applies to all staff of the school. Departments apply only to staff; documents shared with students are visible to all students of the school.

Administrators always see a document so they can review it. You set staff departments under Management → Staff → Assign Departments.

Status and Publication

• Draft — only visible in management and not yet available for chat questions.
• Published — visible in Documents and searchable within the set scope.
• Archived — kept in management but not actively available to users.

A safe workflow is: add as Draft, check content and scope, test representative questions, and then publish. Archive outdated knowledge and prevent conflicting versions from being published simultaneously.

Organization Ownership and Retention

When a source file becomes central knowledge, it moves from personal storage to organization storage. The personal owner and folder link are removed. The knowledge document is thus preserved if the original uploader’s account is later deleted.

Use Archived if knowledge should no longer be active but must be retained. Delete a document only if the source file, canonical version, and search index may also be permanently removed.

What is OKF?

OKF (Open Knowledge Format) is the transferable format of the central knowledge base. It consists of plain Markdown with YAML frontmatter for content metadata.

---
type: "beleid"
title: "Schoolprotocol"
resource: "schoolprotocol.pdf"
tags: ["beleid", "veiligheid"]
source_format: "pdf"
source_file: "schoolprotocol.pdf"
---

# Schoolprotocol

## Veilig melden

De inhoud staat in normale, leesbare Markdown.

Publication status and school scope remain separate security settings in AI-School; they are not part of the transferable document.

Importing and Exporting OKF

With the export button you download the central knowledge documents as a ZIP bundle. The bundle contains Markdown documents, an index.md, and an export log. The original PDF or Word file remains stored in AI-School as a source.

With the import button you add a ZIP bundle with Markdown documents. Imported documents start as Draft, so an administrator can check title, content, scope, and metadata before publication.

A bundle can contain a maximum of 25 Markdown documents and 8 MB of packed and unpacked content. Divide larger collections over multiple bundles.

End-to-End Checking

1. Publish a document with a clearly recognizable fact.
2. Log in as a user of a school within the set scope.
3. Check whether the document appears under Documents and can be opened.
4. Ask a relevant question in a regular chat without manually selecting the document.
5. Check whether the answer matches the document and the central source is mentioned.
6. Repeat the test with a user outside the scope; they should not see or use the document via chat.

For files that a user links only to one conversation, see Chat with documents.

SharePoint Folder as Central Knowledge Source

An administrator can link a SharePoint folder to the knowledge base. The documents from that folder and subfolders are automatically processed; employees use them via the existing knowledge base and in relevant chat questions, regardless of the chosen language model. They do not need to enable their personal SharePoint integration for this.

Prepare Microsoft

First follow the complete steps in Setting up Microsoft 365: the organization app, the application permission with admin consent and a separate read grant. A folder grant (Files.SelectedOperations.Selected) is recommended: the app then only reads the chosen folder in your existing SharePoint structure. A site grant (Sites.Selected) gives the app read access to the entire site. The server connection uses the same organization app as for sign-in and does not require an additional redirect URL.

Link folder

1. Open Admin → Knowledge Base → Add → SharePoint folders → Link folder.
2. Enter a title and paste the URL of the folder. Use the normal folder URL or the URL from the SharePoint file view with an id parameter, not an invitation link. Choose the Microsoft access and, for a folder grant, enter the drive ID and item ID that IT looked up when creating the grant.
3. Choose the same school/location or environment rights and target audience as for a separate knowledge document. Select departments if applicable.
4. Choose Published to make the content available and save. A draft remains outside the offered knowledge.
5. Check the processing status. Refresh updates the status; Sync now rechecks the folder and retries errors.

Target audience of the folder

The content is shared according to the chosen knowledge base permissions, also with users without their own SharePoint access. Individual SharePoint permissions are not inherited. Only link a folder whose entire content is intended for this audience.

New and changed documents are automatically checked, normally every 15 minutes. Deleted or moved files from the folder disappear at the next check. Subfolders with their own permissions without the app are skipped. There is a maximum of 250 supported documents per source and 25 MiB per document. Supported formats are PDF, DOCX, PPTX, XLSX, Markdown, text, CSV, HTML and JSON. External shortcuts and other file formats are skipped.

Edit the content in SharePoint and manage the knowledge base permissions via the linked source. Unlinking immediately hides the documents and stops new imports; saved private copies are not permanently deleted by this. The source list shows why a synchronization fails: Microsoft denies access to the folder (grant revoked, folder moved or deleted) or the organization app cannot sign in (secret or admin consent). During an error, the source content is not offered, not even in chat answers. A revoked grant takes effect at the next check, not immediately. Recovery can be done via a next synchronization.

Availability

This extension was published and tested on October 14, 2026 for OnderwijsSupport on AI-Corporate. Ask platform management to confirm availability on another environment before setting up Microsoft permissions.