Making sense of large document sets
Getting through budgets, court files and hundreds of pages of PDF when nobody has a week to read them.
Outcome
A concise map of a document set that helps a person find and read the important pages. The summary is a navigation aid, not a replacement for the source.
Data gate
- Public: published reports, gazettes, and public judgments can use a checked cloud or local route.
- Internal: draft reports, budgets, and partner submissions need an approved account or local route.
- Identifiable: case files, testimony, personnel records, and documents with hidden personal data stay local or are reviewed without AI.
Use AI when
- You need themes, a document inventory, or likely passages to read first.
- The tool can cite pages or passages and you have the original files.
- Missing scans, unreadable pages, and duplicate versions can be detected.
Do not use AI when
- The summary will be quoted or treated as evidence without opening the source.
- The document set mixes public and protected files that have not been separated.
- The tool cannot show which pages it read or skipped.
Workflow
- Prepare: inventory files, remove duplicates, classify sensitivity, and confirm that text can be extracted from every page.
- Process: ask for a structured summary with page references and an explicit list of unreadable or missing material.
- Verify: open the pages for every consequential claim and sample at least one claim from each section.
- Store: save the summary beside the exact source set, prompt, date, and reviewer.
Human verification checklist
- File and page counts match the source set.
- Important claims, numbers, quotations, and exceptions point to real pages.
- Scans and appendices were either read or clearly marked missing.
- The summary separates source statements from interpretation.
If it fails
Run OCR on unreadable public or approved local documents, reduce the batch size, and ask narrower questions. If page references remain wrong, discard the summary and return to manual review.
Start next
Choose a recipe below before choosing a tool. A source-grounded assistant such as NotebookLMNotebookLMOnly approved or redacted sensitive materialHas a free version: Core access is free with source and usage limits.View tool can make passages easier to find, but uploaded files still need an appropriate data route.
Prompts for this task
Redact first
Turn a long document into a one-page brief
15 minutes · Gives you short sections · Works on a phone
Answer in [ANSWER LANGUAGE], even if the material below is in another language. Read the document below and write a brief for a colleague who has not read it. Rules: 1. Use only what is in the document. Add nothing from your own knowledge. If you are not sure whether something is in it, leave it out. 2. Every point must name the page, article or section it comes from. 3. Quote the exact wording for anything that could be disputed. 4. Copy every number and date in the digit form the document uses, and flag it where the document mixes digits: ١٢٣ alongside 123. 5. Do not soften and do not dramatise. Give me, in this order: A. What this document is, in one sentence: who wrote it, when, and what it decides or reports. B. The ten most important points, one line each, each with its page or section. Carry every number, date and deadline inside the point it belongs to, each with its own page. C. What the document does NOT say that a reader would expect it to. D. Three questions this document leaves open. Document: [PASTE THE DOCUMENT]
Redact first
Find the clause that answers your question
10 minutes · Gives you short sections · Works on a phone
Answer in [ANSWER LANGUAGE], even if the material below is in another language. You have one question and one long document. Find the clause that answers it. Rules: 1. Use only the document below. Never answer from general knowledge about how such documents usually read. 2. Quote, never paraphrase. Copy the clause word for word, with its number or heading as printed, including mixed digits: ١٢٣ alongside 123. 3. If the document does not answer the question, write "The document does not answer this" and then give the nearest related clause, quoted. 4. Search the whole document for anything that changes the answer: a definition, an exception, an annex, a later clause that overrides an earlier one. 5. Mark anything you are unsure about with [CHECK] and say why in one line. Give me, in this order: A. The clause that answers my question, quoted in full, with its number. B. What it means in practice, in one plain sentence. C. Anything elsewhere in the document that limits it, extends it or contradicts it, each quoted with its number. D. Every [CHECK] you marked, one line each. My question: [WRITE YOUR QUESTION IN ONE SENTENCE] Document: [PASTE THE DOCUMENT]
Redact first
Turn a long report into eight minutes for a board
15 minutes · Gives you short sections · Works on a phone
Answer in [ANSWER LANGUAGE], even if the material below is in another language. I have eight minutes on a board agenda. Read the report below and write what the board needs, not a summary of the report. Rules: 1. Use only the report below. Add nothing from your own knowledge. 2. Every point names the page it rests on. A point with no page is removed, not kept. 3. Quote the report's own wording for anything a board member could dispute. 4. Copy every figure exactly as printed, including mixed digits: ١٢٣ alongside 123. 5. Do not soften and do not dramatise. Short sentences only. Give me, in this order: A. The three decisions this board must actually take, one line each, with the page each rests on and what happens if it is delayed. B. The two risks the report itself names, quoted, each with its page. C. What the report does not answer that a board will ask, as three questions. D. One slide of numbers: at most six figures, each with a label and its page. Report: [PASTE THE REPORT]
Tools that help with this
- Never for sensitive materialHas a free versionWorks in Iraq
- Never for sensitive materialHas a free versionWorks in Iraq
- Never for sensitive materialHas a free versionWorks in Iraq
- Only approved or redacted sensitive materialHas a free versionWe do not know whether it works in Iraq
- Only approved or redacted sensitive materialHas a free versionWorks offlineWorks in Iraq, but not fully
- Only approved or redacted sensitive materialHas a free versionWorks in Iraq
- Only approved or redacted sensitive materialHas a free versionWorks in Iraq
- Controlled route for sensitive materialHas a free versionWorks offlineWorks in Iraq
Step-by-step guides for this
- Only approved or redacted sensitive material
- Only approved or redacted sensitive material