Attaching files

1. 1

   Choose the file

   Click Add (the plus) in the message field, then Attach file. You can also drag files onto the chat or paste them from the clipboard into the message field.
2. 2

   Wait for the upload

   Each file appears as a card above the message field. While it says Uploading, Custodos is reading the file. The card then shows how many characters of text were found, or Image for a picture. The X on the card removes a file again before you send.
3. 3

   Ask and send

   Write what you want to do with the file, for example “Summarise the notice periods”, and send the message.

Custodos extracts the text from the file and gives it to the model. For images, a model that can read images receives the picture itself.

Custodos cannot read some common formats. The message then names the format and says what to convert the file to. Save the file again in its original program and attach it once more.

Images in other formats are converted to JPEG by your browser before upload, as long as it can open them, for example HEIC photos from an iPhone in Safari. The last row of the table applies to images where that does not work.

An attached file belongs to the chat, not just to one message. Custodos gives it to the model again with every further message. So you can still ask about a file much later in the same chat without uploading it again.

The flip side: every file takes up room in the model's context window. When the chat and its attachments together get too long, Custodos shows a notice. Then it helps to remove an attached file, start a new chat or choose a model with a larger context window, see Models.

With long files, a model with tools reads the relevant sections. It searches them for words, not for meaning. If nothing may be missed, ask explicitly for the whole file to be worked through. If a model without tools cannot fit all attachments into the request, Custodos leaves out whole files and tells the model which ones are missing.

For large Excel and CSV files, the model first gets an overview: column headers, data types, number of values, smallest and largest values and a few sample rows. From there, a model with tools reads specific ranges or has sums, averages and groupings calculated. This lets it work with spreadsheets that would be too large to read row by row.

If Custodos finds no readable text in a file, it turns the file away. This can happen with scanned PDFs that have no text layer. The message starts with the file name and continues contains no readable text, probably a scan. In that case attach the pages as images or paste the text directly.

Damaged or password-protected files cannot be opened. Remove the password protection in the original program and attach the file again.

Before sending, Custodos checks the text of every file for personal data, just like your messages. Depending on your workspace's settings, it replaces detected values with placeholders and shows a notice above the message field. If your workspace blocks a category, a file containing such details is not taken. Details are under Protecting personal data.

What is stored is the extracted text, not the original file. The exceptions are images and PDF, Word, Excel and PowerPoint files of up to 4 MB that you upload directly. Their original is kept so the model can edit them on request, see Editing your files. Attachments are deleted together with the chat.