Document Analysis

When you upload a document to Signal, the AI reads it automatically and writes a short summary of what it contains. This saves you time and helps you quickly understand a document, even if it is lengthy or hard to read.

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What document analysis does

Signal’s AI does two things with every document it can read:

• Reads the document — including typed PDFs, scanned documents, and photographs of handwritten notes. The text it reads is not shown to you directly, but it is what the summary is written from, and it is what both the AI Assistant and the incident search read when looking for a term.
• Writes a summary — a concise overview of the key information, so you can grasp the main points without reading the whole document.

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Analysed documents become searchable

Once Signal has read a document, its contents are searchable everywhere you would look for an incident:

• The incident search bar — searching the incident list matches text inside attached files, not just the incident’s own description and comments. See Managing Incidents.
• The AI Assistant — you can ask about a single student, or ask a whole-school question such as “which incidents mention the LADO?” and the Assistant will search attachments across the school. When an answer comes from a file, it says so and links the document.

This matters most for the records schools rarely retype. A letter confirming a social care referral, minutes from a strategy meeting, or a LADO response is usually filed exactly as it arrived. Before documents were searchable, a search for “LADO” would find nothing even when the letters were sitting on the incidents — the words were in the file, not the description.

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When analysis is especially useful

Document analysis is most valuable when you are dealing with:

• Scanned handwritten notes — staff observation notes, handwritten letters from parents, or meeting notes that would take time to decipher.
• Lengthy reports — multi-page reports from external agencies, educational psychologist assessments, or social services documentation.
• External agency correspondence — letters and reports from social services, CAMHS, police, or other organisations that often contain dense, formal language.
• Historical records — older documents that may be scanned copies or photocopies with reduced legibility.

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How to use document analysis

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Viewing the summary

Click View summary beside any analysed document to open it. The panel shows the document’s name and the AI’s summary of its key points, findings, or recommendations. To read the document in full, click the document itself in the list — the original file opens in a new tab.

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Correcting a summary

If a summary is wrong, thin, or missing the point, you can rewrite it yourself. Open the ⋮ menu beside the document and choose Edit. A panel opens on the right where you can rewrite the summary and rename the document. Owners, DSLs and Deputy DSLs can edit any document; other staff can edit the documents they uploaded themselves.

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Document types

A document’s type says what kind of document it is, such as an EHCP or a speech and language report. Signal works it out while it reads the document, so you don’t have to label anything. The type is what lets Signal use a document in the pupil’s learning plan.

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Which documents get a type

A document gets a type when it is a PDF, Word or rich text (RTF) document about one pupil. That means it is:

• uploaded to the pupil’s documents, or
• attached to an incident where they are the only main student.

Photos, spreadsheets and documents on incidents involving several pupils are not given a type. The type shows under the document’s name on the pupil’s Documents tab, next to a tag icon.

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What each type means

Specialist reports are used through their summary. If a summary misses a recommendation, correct it and the next draft will use your version.

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Change a document’s type

If the type is wrong or missing, open the ⋮ menu beside the document and choose Edit. Pick the right type from the Type list, or choose Type not set, and click Save. Your choice is kept, and Signal never changes it back. When you change a document to EHCP or EHCP annual review, Signal reads it again. Its outcomes are ready to use in the pupil’s learning plan a minute or two after you save. The Type list only appears for documents that can have a type, and you can change it on the same documents whose summary you can edit.

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When analysis is not available

A small icon beside the document tells you what happened. Hover over it to see the message. In every case the original file is unaffected — you can still open, download, and share it as normal.

• Still working — a spinner means the AI is still reading the document. If it is taking unusually long, the icon turns amber with “Summary generation is taking longer than expected. Check back later.”
• Unsupported file types — some file types cannot be read. You will see “Document type not supported for analysis”. Older Word, Excel, and PowerPoint files (.doc, .xls, .ppt) are not analysed — save them in the newer format before uploading if you want a summary.
• Analysis failure — occasionally the AI cannot read a document, most often because it is password-protected, damaged, or a very poor-quality scan. You will see “Summary generation failed”. Use Edit to write your own summary in its place.