A quick way to find people, places, companies, and structured answers.
The Research Assistant lets you ask questions, choose your sources, and generate structured answers. You can ask follow-up questions, switch between sources, and export answers.
Start a Research session
To begin:
- Go to the 'Home' tab.
- Type your question into the Research Assistant.
- Press 'Enter' or click the arrow button.
- Your first result will appear shortly.
Choose your sources
You can choose where your answers come from.
- Click 'Source Providers'.
- Toggle on or off:
- Web Search (powered by Bing)
- Library (your AutogenAI documents)
- Answer Bank (internal saved answers)
To add a specific website:
- Click the pencil icon next to 'Web Search'.
- Paste the URL.
- Click 'Add Website'.
- Click 'Apply Changes'.
- Note: Only URLs two levels deep are supported. You’ll be notified if the format isn’t valid.
Use the Document Library as a source (optional)
To select specific files:
- Click 'Source Providers'.
- Click the pencil icon next to 'Library'.
- Choose the desired documents.
- Click 'Apply Selection'.
Use Datasets as a source (optional)
- Click 'Source Providers'.
- Toggle on 'Datasets' only.
- You can also choose to 'Generate using all datasets', or toggle that off to select specific datasets.
This will return answers from your dataset content only.
Ask follow-up questions
Ask follow-up questions within the same session.
The Assistant will remember what you’ve asked, helping you build structured research over time.
View sources
- Click the source beside any answer to view its origin.
For Library or Answer Bank results, click to preview the document or response.
Rename or reopen sessions
All sessions appear in the left-hand sidebar.
- Click a session to reopen it.
- Click the title to rename it.
Export a session to PDF
- In any session, click 'Export to PDF' (top right) to download the entire conversation, including all questions and answers.
Generate tables (optional)
To create a table:
- Ask a question, e.g. “List the available plans in a table format”
- Press 'Enter'.
A formatted table will be generated in the response.
Use or export tables
- Click 'Export to PDF' to save the entire session with the table.
- Or highlight the table and press Ctrl + C (or Cmd + C) to copy and paste it elsewhere.