Category: Building AI Assistants

Parent item: Knowledge and Training

Data Storage Architecture: How LearnWise Stores and Accesses Institutional Information

When organizations evaluate AI assistants for storing and accessing institutional information, one of the most critical technical questions involves data storage methodology. This guide explains LearnWise's approach to storing institutional information and addresses the key question: Should we copy data completely into hosting or use a vector database?

LearnWise's Vector Database Architecture

LearnWise uses a vector database approach hosted on AWS infrastructure. This architecture is specifically designed to optimize AI assistant performance while maintaining security and data integrity.

What is a Vector Database?

A vector database is a specialized data storage system optimized for handling embeddings—mathematical representations of text, images, or other data that AI models can efficiently process and compare.

Here's how it works:

  1. Content Processing: When you add institutional content (websites, PDFs, SharePoint documents), LearnWise converts this information into embeddings using a zero-retention embeddings API
  2. Vector Storage: These embeddings are stored in our vector database
  3. Intelligent Retrieval: When users ask questions, the system performs semantic searches across these vectors to find the most relevant information
  4. Contextual Responses: The AI assistant uses the retrieved context to generate accurate, institution-specific answers

Vector Database vs. Traditional Hosting: A Comparison

Aspect Vector Database (LearnWise Approach) Traditional Data Copying
Search Efficiency Semantic search across all content simultaneously Keyword-based search, slower queries
Storage Optimization Compressed vector representations Full data duplication
Update Speed Incremental updates to changed content only Full data re-sync required
Privacy & Security Data processed into mathematical representations Complete data copies stored
Scalability Handles large datasets efficiently Performance degrades with data volume

Benefits of LearnWise's Vector Database Approach

1. Enhanced Privacy and Security