Uploading files during a conversation

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When you upload one or more documents directly into the Orchestrate Chat thread, the agent retrieves information or answers questions based on the uploaded content. By grounding the agent's responses in actual file content, the system improves factual accuracy.

Uploading files helps you to:

  • Get responses tailored to your exact documents.

  • Share context quickly without copying text into the chat.

  • Ask follow‑up questions and explore your content more efficiently.

  • Reduce mistakes because the agent uses your actual file content.

When you upload documents, the agent can:

  • Read and analyze the text in your files.

  • Answer questions about the content.

  • Summarize or explain sections.

  • Compare multiple documents that you upload in the same chat.

  • Help you extract insights, lists, tables, or key points.

Before you begin

Uploading documents in the Orchestrate Chat for AWS, IBM Cloud, and On-premises deployments is not enabled by default. For more details, refer to Enabling the user to interact with documents.

Know about the file size restrictions and supported file types before you upload the documents:

File requirements overview

Table 1. File requirements

Category

Details

File naming

Each file must have a unique, descriptive name.

Maximum file size

Up to 8 MB for: .docx, .pdf, .pptx, .xlsx

Maximum file size (text and structured formats)

Up to 5 MB for: .csv, .html, .txt

Maximum number of files per batch

20 files

Maximum size of a batch of files

8 MB (combined)

Supported file formats

.txt, .pdf, .csv, .docx, .xlsx, .pptx, .html

Uploading files

You can upload a single file or multiple files in a batch.

  1. Click File Upload icon File Upload icon from the Orchestrate Chat.

  2. Drag-and-drop the files into the chat or use Search and upload to browse and select files from your system. Selected file appears in the chat prompt bar.

  3. Click Send Send icon to upload your files to the server.

See the successfully uploaded file name in the chat prompt. Hover over the file chip to see the complete file name.

If a tool requires a document, it must be uploaded through the tools interface. Documents that are uploaded through Orchestrate Chat are used only for interactive chat purposes and not for document processing or tool-related uploads.

Validating the files before upload

Each file is automatically validated in the chat prompt bar before sent to the server. You can see the error messages in the chat prompt bar when the requirements from Before you begin are not met.

File validation behavior

Table 2. File validation

Scenario

What happens

What you can do

Next step

Single file upload

- The file is checked automatically. - If validation fails, you immediately see an error message in the chat prompt bar.

- Fix the issue (for example: unsupported format, size too large). - Or remove the affected file.

- After you resolve the issue, click Send Send icon to upload the validated file.

Multiple file upload

- All files are individually validated. - Valid files are queued in the chat prompt bar. - Files that fail validation show an error state.

- Review the overall error message that appears in the prompt bar. - Click the error icon on each problematic file chip to view the specific issue. - Fix the issue or remove the affected files.

- Once all issues are resolved, click Send Send icon to upload the validated files.

Post‑upload behavior

After you upload your files successfully, they become immediately available for use within the current chat session. The agent analyzes and indexes the content so that it can provide accurate, grounded responses to your questions.

Validating files after upload

On successful uploading of the documents, the agent gives responses to your queries based on the uploaded documents.

You can see error messages in the chat stream when the system:

  • Fails to load the document.

  • Fails to process the document.

  • Determines that the file contains nonextractable or corrupted content.

If a file fails to process, you can update the file and upload it again.

Removing uploaded files

Click File remove File remove icon to remove the uploaded file before you send it to server.

Note:

You cannot remove the uploaded file after it is sent to the server.

Security and compliance

watsonx Orchestrate applies strict security and isolation measures to protect your uploaded documents. Files are isolated to the current chat conversation, securely stored with encryption, and never shared across conversations or used for training. Access is controlled through time-limited, signed URLs that expire after a defined period.

For comprehensive information about how uploaded documents are secured, isolated, and retained, see Chat privacy and data protection.