Towards Data Science

FAQ as RAG: When You Get to Design the Corpus

The article discusses how an FAQ can invert the traditional Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) pipeline. It explains that parsing becomes trivial, retrieval functions as a cache, and few‑shot prompting is reframed as a retrieval problem. The piece highlights the practical implications of designing a corpus around an FAQ structure for enterprise document intelligence.

Towards Data Science
Jun 16

RAG Questions Need Parsing Too: Turn the User’s String Into Briefs for Retrieval and Generation

Enterprise Document Intelligence [Vol. 1 #6a] - Why a user question deserves the same parsing as the document, and how it splits into a retrieval brief and a generation brief before either runs The post RAG Questions Need Parsing Too: Turn the User’s String Into Briefs for Retrieval and Generation appeared first on Towards Data Science .

By angela shi
Towards Data Science
Aug 29

RAG Is Not the Whole Toolkit: The NLP Techniques Real Problems Still Need

The article argues that Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) is only one tool in NLP, and many real-world problems—such as request classification, free‑text matching, table reading, and OCR noise cleaning—are better served by simpler, cheaper techniques. It emphasizes the importance of selecting the appropriate method for each task and highlights the engineering challenge of knowing which technique to apply.

By Kezhan Shi
Towards Data Science
Aug 20

Three Kinds of RAG Corpus, and What It Costs to Build for the Wrong One

The article explains that enterprise document intelligence can be categorized into three distinct corpus types, each requiring a specific architecture. It outlines how to determine the shape of a document collection through three key questions. The piece also discusses the costs associated with building a system for the incorrect corpus type.

By angela shi
Towards Data Science
Jul 16

Context Engineering for RAG Question Parsing: From a Raw Question to Typed Fields That Steer Retrieval and Generation

Enterprise Document Intelligence [Vol. 1 #6quater] - Question parsing takes one messy string and writes four typed pieces, each read by a different downstream call The post Context Engineering for RAG Question Parsing: From a Raw Question to Typed Fields That Steer Retrieval and Generation appeared first on Towards Data Science .

By Kezhan Shi
Towards Data Science
Aug 12

Before Full Agentic RAG: Know How You Decide, and the Parsing Methods You Pick From

Enterprise Document Intelligence [Vol. 1 #5nonies] - Nature, plan, execute, synthesize: closing brick 1 with a dispatcher that reads each PDF’s nature and picks the method that fits, fitz, Docling, PaddleOCR, EasyOCR, MinerU or Surya, then folds the outputs into one corpus The post Before Full Agentic RAG: Know How You Decide, and the Parsing Methods You Pick From appeared first on Towards Data Science .

By angela shi