--- title: "Create and build datasets" description: "Turn a collection of documents into a searchable, chat-ready dataset." canonical: https://ocho.bot/docs/library/create-and-build-datasets last_updated: 2026-07-12 --- # Create and build datasets > Turn a collection of documents into a searchable, chat-ready dataset. > Who can do this: Library admins (role key `super_rag_dataset_admin`). Everyone can view datasets. The **Create dataset** button is visible to everyone, but creating, attaching documents, and building fail for users without the role. ## Create a dataset 1. On the **Datasets** page, click **Create dataset**. In the dialog, enter a **Name** (up to 80 characters) and click **Create**. You land on the new dataset's page. 2. A dataset page has three tabs: **Overview**, **Documents**, and **QA**. The Overview shows a journey stepper: **Add documents → Build → Review → Use in chat**. 3. Click the stepper's **Add documents** button — it opens the **Add documents from library** picker directly, where you select documents. The picker only shows documents not already attached. On the page you land on right after creating, the **Documents** tab shows "Coming soon" — the full Documents tab, with its **Add from library** button (visible to Library admins only), is available when you open the dataset from the **Datasets** list instead. ## Tell Ocho about the content (optional but recommended) Before building, you can answer a short questionnaire about the dataset — what the documents are, who will query them, what matters. Open it with **Tell us about this dataset** (on a draft dataset — on the page you land on after creating, the button appears as soon as at least one document is attached; when you open the dataset from the **Datasets** list, it appears once a document reaches **Indexed**) or **Answer questions** (on a live dataset, where it becomes a rebuild path). Ocho uses your answers to tune the build strategy (single-choice answers advance automatically, and a few adaptive follow-ups may appear). At any point from the first question onward, a **Skip — just build it for me** link at the top of the questionnaire closes it without saving answers. Skipping does not start a build — start it yourself (**Build dataset** on a draft dataset, **Rebuild automatically** on a live one). On the summary card at the end you can: - Click **Save & build with this context** to start the build with your answers, or - Click **Save without building** to keep your answers for later. ## Build Start the build from **Build dataset** on the Overview (or **Save & build with this context** in the questionnaire). On the page you land on after creating, the button appears as soon as at least one document is attached — but starting a build before your documents finish indexing fails with an error telling you the documents aren't ready. When you open the dataset from the **Datasets** list, the button waits until at least one attached document has finished indexing — until then the Overview shows only **Add documents**. The dataset moves through scanning and building — the stepper shows **Analyzing documents…** and then **Building search index…** while the state badge updates. Building takes minutes, depending on volume. ## Review the strategy The **Search setup** section on the Overview is always present. Before a build it explains that the strategy is generated when the dataset is built; after a build it shows what Ocho decided: - The agent's reasoning, in plain language, under **Why these choices**. - **Capabilities** cards — depending on the strategy these can include **Visual retrieval**, **Knowledge graph**, **Scanned-doc OCR**, and **Context enrichment** — each marked On, Recommended, Optional, or Off, with pros and cons. - A **Technical details** disclosure listing the strategy's settings. - **Refine strategy with AI** — a chat where you ask for adjustments ("Disable graph extraction", "Use a larger chunk size"). The AI proposes a **Suggested change** you **Apply** or **Dismiss**. Refinement appears only while a strategy is in the proposed state, and only for Library admins. ## Use it When the dataset reaches **Live**, chat and search can query it. Chat works as soon as the build finishes; regular search works too, even without a knowledge graph. Graph features (like the entity graph) are available only after a knowledge graph is built — the graph builds automatically when the dataset goes live. Library admins can opt a dataset out with the **Automatic graph updates** toggle on the Knowledge Graph card, and can also build or rebuild the graph manually from the same card. On a live dataset the stepper offers **Try a new strategy** with two options: **Rebuild automatically** and **Answer questions**. Rebuilding takes the dataset offline for a few minutes — a confirmation dialog warns you first. ## Good to know - A build needs at least one attached document that has finished indexing — wait for documents to reach **Indexed** first. If some attached documents aren't indexed yet, the build fails with a clear error telling you to wait or remove them. - The document picker shows up to 200 unattached documents. Its search box filters only those loaded documents, so with a very large library some documents may not be reachable from the picker. - Answers to the questionnaire are saved (use **Save without building** if you're not ready to build) — you can revisit and change them before a rebuild via **Answer questions**. All docs: https://ocho.bot/docs --- Ocho — AI knowledge orchestration · [Home](https://ocho.bot/) · [Docs](https://ocho.bot/docs) · [Blog](https://ocho.bot/blog) · [About](https://ocho.bot/about) · [Developers](https://ocho.bot/developers) · [Contact](https://ocho.bot/contact) · [llms.txt](https://ocho.bot/llms.txt)