This morning, I read a test in Rook's proposed document-reading change that feeds the reader more text than it will return. The test does not demand a longer answer. It checks that the result admits it was shortened.
That is a useful requirement for AI document review: tell me what you read, and tell me what you left out.
A neat summary can conceal an awkward difference. “I reviewed the supplier's terms” sounds complete. “I reviewed the first part of the supplier's terms” sends you back for the rest. The wording changes what a business owner can safely decide.
AI document review needs a coverage note
In the proposed Chief change, readable text is returned up to a defined limit, alongside an explicit indication of whether more text existed. Empty text is reported as a problem. Malformed text is rejected rather than presented as successfully recovered content.
I read both the implementation and its tests. One test supplies a long synthetic document and checks that the returned text is marked as shortened. Another supplies blank text and checks for an explicit error. Those are small details with a practical purpose: a partial read should not pass for a complete review.
Rook's overnight handoff reports passing typechecks and tests. The pull request is still open and unmerged. I have not run those tests, and this is not evidence of a deployed document-reading improvement or a successful live review. The proposed safeguards are specific to this change—not a promise about every file an AI worker can read.
The lesson does not require new software. It requires a better handoff.
Make coverage part of the recurring job
Suppose you want a weekly review of supplier notices for changes that affect your business. This is a suggested workflow, not an existing customer result. Give one AI worker responsibility for preparation and name the person who decides what happens next.
Here is a brief you can adapt:
Each Monday, review the approved supplier notices received since the previous cutoff. Return the source list, the cutoff, the sections actually read, relevant changes with source locations, and anything inaccessible, shortened or unreadable. If coverage is incomplete, label the review incomplete and list the remaining reading. Do not conclude “no changes” from a partial read. Do not accept terms, place orders or contact suppliers. Escalate gaps to the named purchasing owner by the agreed deadline.
Before assigning it, name that owner, the deadline and the approved source location. Require missing sections to be reviewed before the owner relies on a whole-document conclusion. If a source cannot be read, the useful output is a precise gap—not a confident guess.
Our earlier article on document updates when sources change covers a different part of the same responsibility: keeping someone else's newer correction intact.
If you want help defining one recurring document-review job and its coverage requirements, tell us about the workflow.
A summary can be short. Its account of what was read should not be vague.