Choosing what Deep Research reads
The perimeter is the set of files a research run is allowed to read. Choosing it well is most of the work: too narrow and it misses things, too wide and it spends time and credits on documents that were never relevant.
Good afternoon
Tip: mention a meeting with @ to draft its follow-up
Add to chat once everything is green
- Tick the files or folders to research
- Grey means it is not indexed yet
- Index it here, no need to leave
- Add to chat once everything is green
Picking files and folders
Open Deep Research from the plus menu
The file picker opens.Tick files, or whole folders
A folder brings everything inside it.Press Add to chat
The blue pill appears in the composer.
The indexing dots
Every row carries a dot. Green means indexed and usable. A partial dot on a folder means only some of its files are indexed. Anything not indexed cannot be researched, because there is nothing to search inside.
Indexing files that are not ready
The picker has Upload & index for new files and Index all here for a folder. Individual rows offer Index now, or Retry index if a previous attempt failed. See adding and indexing files.
The progress step
After choosing, you see a progress screen that groups your selection into complete, in progress, waiting and failed. Add to chat only enables once everything you selected is ready. This is deliberate: a run that silently skipped half your files would be worse than waiting.
Turning it off
Tap the blue Deep Research pill in the composer. That clears the whole perimeter.