Answers come from approved documents, not the open internet
The system only answers from documents the company has reviewed and approved. Industry codes. OEM manuals. Company SOPs. Project files. Nothing else.
Every response carries an inline citation — document name, section, page. If a source cannot be cited, the system says so instead of guessing. This page describes what goes into the knowledge base, how documents get in, and what is kept out.
Approved documents are the only source the assistant retrieves from — one of the four constraints that defines AirOrchestra. The others are fixed role, fixed scope, and citation-or-refusal. See the approach.
The index, the documents, and the foundation model all live on the same machine inside the company's office. Nothing crosses the network for retrieval. Where the model lives.
Six document categories
The knowledge base is built from six categories of source documents. Each document is tagged, versioned, and tied to the company that owns it. A company's base is separate from every other company's base.
Industry codes & standards
SMACNA duct construction standards, ASHRAE 90.1 and 62.1, NFPA 90A, IBC and IMC mechanical chapters, NEC electrical sections relevant to HVAC, OSHA construction standards. Loaded at onboarding and version-tracked as revisions are published.
OEM documentation
Equipment manuals, startup procedures, fault code references, wiring diagrams, and commissioning sequences for the specific manufacturers and models the company actually installs. Carrier, Daikin, Trane, Mitsubishi, LG — whichever lines are in use. Not generic internet specs.
Company standards & SOPs
Approved install methods, hanger schedules, quality checkpoints, accepted field practices, safety procedures. The way the company does things. Written by the operations lead, reviewed by the owner, kept current as field practice evolves.
Project history
RFIs, change orders, field decisions, solved problems, mistakes and corrections, lessons learned from completed jobs. Every closed project contributes to the base, so the same question does not get solved from scratch twice.
Project specifications
Contract documents, mechanical specifications, engineer submittals, approved shop drawings for active projects. When a question is project-specific, the answer is grounded in that project's documents, not generic guidance.
Safety documentation
Site-specific safety plans, equipment-specific hazard briefs, PPE requirements, confined space procedures, OSHA 10 and 30 training records, competent person assignments. Kept current per project and per crew member.
How a document gets in
No document is ingested automatically. Every file that enters the base passes through a three-step review before it becomes searchable.
Submitted
A document is uploaded by the operations lead, safety manager, project manager, or owner. The person submitting names the document, identifies its category, and notes whether it supersedes a prior version.
Reviewed and approved
The designated knowledge manager (typically the operations lead) opens the document, confirms it is complete and current, assigns the category, tags it with a version number, and approves it. Approval is logged with reviewer name, date, and document hash.
Indexed
Once approved, the document is parsed, chunked by section and page, and added to the company's knowledge base. Prior versions are archived, not deleted. The document becomes citable in answers within minutes.
No document enters the system without human sign-off.
What is kept out
The base is narrow on purpose. Sources the company has not reviewed do not get to influence answers.
- The open internet
- ChatGPT training data or other general-purpose model knowledge
- OEM spec pages that have not been verified against the actual manual
- Documents from prior employers, competitors, or unlicensed copies
- Drafts, red-lines, and working files that have not been approved
- Personal notes, text messages, or email threads outside the approved record
A grounded answer, with citations
Illustrative example. The exchange below is constructed to show the shape of an answer that draws on multiple approved sources. It is not a real production transcript and the specifics shown are not provided as an HVAC reference.
Crew member via Telegram
AirOrchestra
Sources cited: Daikin VRV-IV-S Installation Manual (OEM documentation), SMACNA-PNW-2023 Company Standards Document (company standards & SOPs)