Your first research project in Atlas

This tutorial takes one question through a complete Atlas research loop. You will create a project, add a source, ask about it, inspect one citation, and save what you learned in a note.

What you need

• One source you can legally import: a PDF, a web article, a YouTube video, or an academic paper.
• A specific question you want to answer with that source.
• Ten to fifteen minutes for processing after you add the source.

Choose a source that contains a claim, method, or result you want to investigate. A paper, report, or focused article works better for this tutorial than a home page or an unreadable PDF.

1. Create a project

Create a project for the question or source set you are investigating. Use a name that will still make sense when you return later.

Good names:

• "Carbon removal literature review"
• "RAG evaluation papers"
• "Client research: AI note-taking tools"

Avoid generic names like "Test" or "New project." Atlas organizes everything by project, so the name helps you stay oriented across sessions.

2. Add one source

Add a PDF, website, YouTube video, or academic paper to the project. If you are unsure which type to use, read Source types.

After adding the source, wait for processing to finish. Processing is what makes the source available for chat, citations, summaries, and knowledge maps. It typically takes one to three minutes.

If processing fails, stop here and read Troubleshoot source processing. A source that did not process cannot produce reliable citations.

3. Inspect the source before asking questions

Open the source from the project list. Check that the content looks correct.

For PDFs, skim the abstract, headings, and conclusion. For web pages and transcripts, check that the visible text is what you expected.

This check catches incomplete imports and wrong-document uploads before they affect the answer.

4. Ask a specific question

Open chat and ask a narrow question the source can answer. Good first questions:

• What is the main claim of this source?
• What evidence supports that claim?
• What methods does the source use?
• What limitations does the source identify?

Read the answer once for relevance. Then check whether its important claims include citation badges.

5. Verify one citation

Select a citation badge in the answer. The source viewer opens at the passage Atlas used. Read the surrounding text so you can see the claim, its evidence, and any nearby limitation.

You are confirming that the source supports the claim Atlas made. If it does, you have completed the citation verification loop. If the citation does not match, ask a narrower follow-up or read Troubleshoot citations and weak answers.

6. Save a finding

Create a note for the insight you want to keep. Include:

• The claim in your own words.
• The source that supports it, linked with @.
• Why it matters for the project.

This turns a one-off chat answer into a durable, linked record.

Check your result

Your project should now have:

• One processed source.
• One chat answer with a citation you verified.
• One note that mentions the source it draws from.

Next steps

• Add a second source: Add your first source
• Synthesize across sources: Synthesize across multiple sources
• Learn how citations work: How Atlas grounds answers in sources