What the documents look like
Cross-border product compliance and labeling materials center on product safety and label evidence. The main sources are platform policy centers, testing laboratory reports, destination-country regulation libraries, and supplier materials. Documents handled day to day include product test reports, English-language labels, MSDS files, and platform prohibited-item lists. These materials are retrieved during order fulfillment and after-sales question answering to address label content, report coverage scope, and prohibited-list attribution.
A single product may accumulate multiple test reports or label drafts over time. Retrieval results must distinguish which product, which destination country, and which version a document corresponds to. A conclusion drawn from one report does not transfer to another product or another destination country.
Constraints at the retrieval step
The knowledge base search node can associate one or more knowledge bases that use the same vector model. Knowledge bases using different vector models cannot be associated together. The identifier should be checked first, non-matching bases excluded, and actual observations recorded. Retrieval operates on the entire knowledge base as the smallest search unit; collections serve only classification management and do not affect search results.
Semantic retrieval relies on vector distance and suits natural-language questions. Full-text retrieval suits numbers, model codes, proper nouns, and error codes. Hybrid retrieval uses both recall paths and merges results through RRF. The minimum relevance score takes effect only under semantic retrieval or when result reranking is used; it is a filtering threshold and does not perform permission or entity isolation. The reference limit is measured in tokens, so materials with widely varying lengths need separate checks for content completeness. Question optimization performs coreference resolution and question expansion, adds an extra model call, and may alter the question subject, so the original question and the optimized question need comparison.
Hypothetical paper exercise sample: an English label draft states "Product: Model A, Destination: Germany, Version: 2024-06." A test report states "Model A, Test scope: EN 71-3, Report date: 2024-05-10." A platform prohibited-item list states "Model B, Destination: Germany, Status: listed." A draft sentence awaiting judgment reads "Model A has completed all German destination-country compliance requirements and can be listed directly." The retrieval scope is limited to the knowledge base containing these three documents.
Configuration and implementation checks
| Configuration item | Starting point for this hypothetical exercise | Reason and comparison method |
|---|---|---|
| Associated knowledge base | Associate only the single-vector-model base containing the three documents above | Check the vector model identifier first, exclude different-model bases, do not run cross-model retrieval comparisons |
| Search mode | Hybrid retrieval | The sample contains precise terms such as model code and destination country plus a natural-language draft sentence; compare semantic, full-text, and hybrid recall differences |
| Reference limit | Starting point for this exercise set to the token amount covering the full text of the three documents | This value is a starting point only; compare against materials of different lengths to check whether content is truncated, then adjust |
| Minimum relevance score | Annotate relevant and irrelevant samples first, then set a starting value | Takes effect only under semantic retrieval or result reranking; compare candidate changes before and after filtering |
| Question optimization | Off first; retrieve once with the original question | Compare whether the subject of the original question and the optimized question match, then decide whether to enable |
| Result reranking | Enable once when a rerank model is available | Compare scores and ordering before and after reranking, confirm candidates are sufficient |
Three common errors
- Treating a retrieval hit as authorization. The draft sentence claims Model A has completed all German compliance requirements. Retrieval may hit the label draft and the test report, but the test report covers only EN 71-3, and the label draft states only a version. Neither states that all destination-country compliance requirements are met. Retrieval is content lookup, not authorization or compliance confirmation.
- Associating knowledge bases that use different vector models. If another base uses a different vector model, the identifier should be checked and the base excluded, with actual observations recorded. No inference should be drawn about recall gaps or redundant returns after joint association.
- Treating the minimum relevance score as an entity or permission filter. This value only filters low-relevance results and cannot exclude Model B in the prohibited-item list or unauthorized records. The prohibited-item list states Model B with status listed, a different entity from Model A, and the two cannot be mixed.
How to verify the setup
- Input the full text of the three documents above and the draft sentence. Compare "Model A," "Germany," and "all compliance requirements" in the draft sentence against the product, destination country, and test scope stated in the source text. A contradiction can be determined only when the source text explicitly states mutually exclusive values for the same product, same destination country, and same field. If not stated, or only related-stage evidence exists, record as unsupported or pending verification.
- Input a paper document containing only the Model B prohibited-item list. Compare whether the retrieval output is an explicit empty result array []. Check whether the downstream design accepts empty references. Do not claim that a fictional rule retrieval necessarily returns [].
- Input the original question and the question-optimized version. Compare whether the subjects match. If the optimized question changes the product, destination country, or version, record as pending verification and do not use it to determine compliance status.