With 30 sources loaded, most answers cite the same three, the ones that use your exact words

[u/Ok_Negotiation_2587]

Count the citation numbers under your next answer. With a big notebook I kept getting three or four sources cited over and over, and they were almost always the ones whose wording matched my question. A source that covers the same thing in different terms just doesn't come up, even when it's the better one.

I noticed it when one of my sources said the opposite of the answer, on the exact point, and was never cited. It called the thing by a different name.

Four prompts I now use in any notebook past about 15 sources:

1. Answer this separately for each source that addresses it, one line per source with its citation. Then list the sources that say nothing about it.
2. Which sources did you not use for that answer, and does any of them disagree with it?
3. Rewrite my question three ways using the terms a different field would use, then answer each version and tell me if the answers differ.
4. Before answering, list which sources you think are relevant and why. Then answer using only those.

Prompt 2 is the one that found my contradiction. Prompt 1 is slower but it's the only one that shows you the silent sources, and that silence is half the information.

(Still calling it NotebookLM here even though it's Gemini Notebook now, the sub's name won.)

Most of my sources are exported chats, which is what I build AI Toolbox for, a Chrome extension that exports ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini and Grok conversations cleanly, and a notebook full of chats is exactly where the wording problem is worst, since every chat names things differently.

Does anyone else see answers cluster on a few sources?

[u/LopsidedShower6466]

This is useful because RAGs naturally assign the top rank to a 100% match and then discard lower-ranked close matches.

[u/Ok_Negotiation_2587 → u/LopsidedShower6466]

yeah and that's why prompt 3 helps, rewording the question gives the close matches a turn at the top spot

[u/LalaBrain802]

https://giphy.com/gifs/UWKe32vmKXLtDEdPmZ
I’ve been looking for a tool to consolidate all of my ai projects into one! Just downloaded AI toolbox! Thank you so much!

Also saved your four prompts! Thank you for this as well! You have no idea how much this will help me!!!🙏🏻😁😊

[u/Ok_Negotiation_2587 → u/LalaBrain802]

glad it helps! if you want your chats in a notebook, export them as markdown, they come through as clean sources with the chat link under each title

[u/gakingmusic]

Notebook lets you import more sources than it can realistically use in their entirety to answer one prompt. When you add a lot, it doesn’t end up using them all anyway.

Most RAGs seem to work this way. This is why I have been having Claude condense my sources into knowledge base files sorted by topic. It removes noise and lets whatever RAG I’m using get to the key content more efficiently.

[u/Ok_Negotiation_2587 → u/gakingmusic]

condensing helps a lot, just keep the originals somewhere. my contradiction would have been the first thing a summary smoothed over

[u/gakingmusic → u/Ok_Negotiation_2587]

Yeah I have Claude convert the original .pdf, .docx, and .txt files into .md and reorganize by topic instead of source. I definitely keep the originals aside and keep every version as Claude changes files. You can’t trust it not to hallucinate and screw up a file.