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Good Document Titles Don't Just Help Humans — They Help Your RAG Pipeline Too

·2 mins
Solutions Knowledge-Management Rag Sharepoint Ai-Tools Documentation
Table of Contents

Back in 2009 I implemented a knowledge management system at GHD Engineering in Brisbane using Windows SharePoint Services. Within six months, IT staff across multiple offices were actively referencing the wiki knowledge base.

What Made It Work #

I attribute the wiki’s success to four things:

  1. A logical naming convention for articles
  2. A structured article body format
  3. Ongoing maintenance of the hierarchical page organisation
  4. Management support and advocacy

The Naming Convention Problem #

Generic summarisation approaches create problems fast. When every article is labelled something vague, a search for “out of office” yields a list of articles your eyes have to painstakingly scan through.

I developed a top-down chunking approach with four hierarchical levels:

  • 1st Level: Category (Software, Hardware, Network)
  • 2nd Level: Brand (Microsoft, Dell, Cisco)
  • 3rd Level: Product Name/Version (Outlook 2010, Optiplex 7700)
  • 4th Level: Article Type (Error, Issue, How To)

Examples:

  • Software - Microsoft - Outlook 2010 - How To - Recover Deleted Items
  • Software - Microsoft - Outlook 2010 - Error - Cannot start Microsoft Outlook
  • Software - Microsoft - Outlook 2010 - Issue - Hyperlinks not working

Article Body Structure #

I implemented a simple template-based system:

  • First Heading: HOW TO, ERROR, or ISSUE
  • Second Heading: SOLUTION

Content varied by article type and included procedural steps, error descriptions, screenshots, and technical explanations. Each article automatically displayed author, modification date, and breadcrumb navigation.

Addressing Contributor Hesitation #

Some staff hesitated to contribute directly due to concerns about proper placement and format adherence. I addressed this by personally managing article submissions — prioritising content capture over structural perfection.

The same principle applies directly to RAG pipelines today. Clear, structured titles make retrieval dramatically more accurate. The discipline is the same; only the technology has changed.