# Buff without a repository: where to start

> The track for a department without code: account and organisation, a space, your documents, the first question, research and the first knowledge entry.

This page is for an employee of a department that has no repository and needs none: support, sales, legal, HR, finance, marketing, a manager, a product manager. What you get:

- **answers to questions about the department’s documents** — policies, contracts, spreadsheets, wiki pages — with a link to the document and section; if two documents disagree, both are named;
- **documents in which the AI agent has reconciled several sources** and named the discrepancies — deep research;
- **the department’s knowledge base**, where a rule is written down once and taken into account in every answer.

The AI agent only reads: documents are not changed, emails are not sent, tickets are not created. The track has six steps; one of them, connecting the documents, is done by your IT specialist.

## 1. Account and organisation

Register and sign in — [Registration and sign-in](/en/docs/quickstart/registration). If the company already has an organisation in Buff, register and ask the owner to invite you: they will give you a role and a scope — usually member (**Contributor** in the interface) on your space (see [Managing members](/en/docs/teams/manage)). If there is no organisation yet, create one — [Organisations](/en/docs/quickstart/organizations).

## 2. Space

A **space** is a workplace without code: “Ask”, deep research, a knowledge base and connections to documents. It is created from just a name — [here is how](/en/docs/quickstart/space).

A space can be created by **the organisation owner or a member who has been given the organisation-wide permission to create projects and spaces** (in the interface this permission is called “Add repositories and sync the project” — yes, spaces are created with it too). If you do not have this permission, ask the owner to create the space or to grant you the permission.

A space is a permission scope, like a project: it makes sense to have **one space per department**. Then HR documents are read only by members with permission on the HR space, and support does not see them until it is given access.

_Illustration: One field — the name. The space appears at once and opens on “Ask”._

## 3. The department’s documents

The documents stay where they are: in Notion, Confluence, on Google Drive, on a server or in a network folder, in Figma. Nothing is copied in advance — the AI agent reads only what was needed for the answer.

**What your IT specialist does once:**

1. installs the [connector](/en/docs/connector) — a small program in the company network; one connector serves all departments;
2. sets up the right connection [from the catalogue](/en/docs/connector/marketplace) — [Notion](/en/docs/connector/notion), [Confluence](/en/docs/connector/knowledge), [Google Drive](/en/docs/connector/google-drive), [files on a server and network folders](/en/docs/connector/files), [Figma](/en/docs/connector/knowledge), [a tracker](/en/docs/connector/trackers), [the internet](/en/docs/connector/web) — or [your own tool](/en/docs/connector/custom-mcp) for a system that is not in the catalogue;
3. names **your space** in the connection as the place where the work goes;
4. selects the **sections and folders** that may be read.

What to hand over to them, point by point — [What to ask your administrator for](/en/docs/for-admin).

**What you can do yourself:**

- on Google Drive — **share the folder** with the account whose address IT gives you, with the “Commenter” permission;
- in Notion — **add the integration to the section**: on the section’s root page, menu “…” → “Connections” → pick the integration; everything nested opens along with it.

**What is read:** Word, Excel and PowerPoint documents (new and old formats), PDFs with a text layer, text files; Google documents, spreadsheets (a sheet and a range) and presentations; Notion pages and databases; Confluence pages; Figma design properties. **Not read** are scans without a text layer and images: there is no text recognition.

## 4. The first question

Open the space → **“Ask”** → a new question. Name the document, section or period if you know it, and say what form the answer should take. Examples:

- “What first-response time does the contract promise a client on the ‘Business’ plan, and does it match the FAQ?”
- “How do I arrange a holiday, and how many days in advance do I submit the request?”
- “Which supplier payments fall in October, and where is there a prepayment?”

The answer comes with a link to the document and section; discrepancies between documents are named. Attach a file that is not in the sources to the question — up to 10 MB. If the answer is “not found”, the [How to ask a good question](/en/docs/asking-well) page explains what that means.

_Illustration: A space in the left-hand menu: only “Ask”, “Deep research”, “Connectors” and “Knowledge base”. The answer is put together from four company documents — with the file and section names._

## 5. Research

When you need not an answer but a document — to bring several sources together, find all the discrepancies, prepare something that will be forwarded — order a [deep research](/en/docs/research). Two roles of the AI agent: the analyst writes, the checker verifies every claim against the sources. The result is a document with links and the discrepancies named, exportable to PDF and a text file. How this differs from a question and when to choose which — [Question or research?](/en/docs/ask-vs-research).

## 6. The first knowledge base entry

The [knowledge base](/en/docs/knowledge) holds the department’s rules, facts and pitfalls; the AI agent sees them in every question and research. Create one or two entries with the “space” scope:

| Type | Example |
| --- | --- |
| **Rule** (written by a person) | “We reply to a client within one working day” |
| **Fact** | “The current price list is in the Sales/Price lists folder” |
| **Pitfall** | “The 2024 procurement policy is outdated — use the 2026 edition” |

Writing to the base is open to a member with the “Create, edit, archive and restore knowledge” permission — by default the space editor has it (Maintainer in the interface); all members of the space can read. The AI agent also adds facts and pitfalls itself, with a mark — [AI entries](/en/docs/knowledge/ai-entries).

## Next

- [Recipes by role](/en/docs/roles) — what to connect and what to ask for support, sales, legal, HR, finance, marketing, a manager and a product manager.
- [Ask right in Notion, a Google Doc or a tracker](/en/docs/ask-from-your-tools) — without opening the app.
- [What a question costs](/en/docs/cost-of-a-question) — what makes up the price and where to see it.
- [Security: what leaves and what does not](/en/docs/security#documents-what-leaves-and-what-does-not) — for the owner of the documents.