AI Sources Management
Bringing transparency and control to the data sources that power Disco's suite of AI tools.
Team
Product Manager
2 Developers
CTO
Tools
Figma/FigJam
Figma Make
Mobbin
Eleven Labs
Skills
Information Architecture
Scalable systems design
AI transparency
Timeline
Oct - Jan 2025
Status
Shipped
Context
Disco is an AI-first learning platform that enables training businesses to manage programming, events, and communities.
Disco's AI feature set had outgrown its data foundation. As new AI tools launched like Ask AI, curriculum generation, and Q&A bots, each pulled from separate, inconsistent sources with no shared control or visibility. Users didn't know what the AI knew, couldn't adjust it, and couldn't trust it.
Opportunity
Build a unified knowledge layer that acts as a centralized system for ingesting, managing, and configuring the data sources that power all of Disco's AI features.
Goal
Make AI more trustworthy, configurable, and capable without requiring users to think about infrastructure.
Process
Before jumping into design, I spent time with engineering to gather an understanding of what AI features existed, what data each one was actually pulling from, and why the current Sources UI felt so confusing to users.
Research
From there, secondary research looked at how other AI-powered products (both direct competitors and adjacent tools like Notion AI, Glean, and knowledge management platforms) handle source transparency and AI orchestration settings. Most shared a common pattern: centralized, well-organized knowledge management with transparent sourcing, flexible role-based control, and support for a wide range of content types and integrations.
Presentation slides
Scoping
With that context, my product manager and I got aligned on what we were actually trying to solve. The north star ended up being pretty simple: clarity, control, and transparency around what sources power each AI feature. We grouped the capabilities based on jobs to be done.
Learning design
Curriculum generator
Content generator
Quiz generator
Community engagement
Message generator
Post generator
Suggested replies/posts
Utilities
Suggestion actions from reports
Write with AI
Video transcription, summaries and chapters
Solution
Capabilities page
A single view of every AI feature in Disco, organized into three capability groups based on job-to-be-done. Sources are shared within each group and configurable at the group level, keeping controls simple without sacrificing flexibility.
Sources
Every source powering Disco's AI is now visible in one place. Internal sources are surfaced automatically so nothing is hidden, and external sources can be added and managed here when want to bring in public content from outside the platform.
Adding external sources
External sources Disco AI’s knowledge using public content. You can customize source usage per AI tool where supported.
Links: Individual, publicly accessible URLs
Knowledge Bases: Public-facing spaces from tools like Notion, Zendesk, or Pylon
External links can now be used across any generation feature — posts, content, messages, and more. Links saved in Sources are reusable, so admins don't have to re-add them each time.