> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.variable.global/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Documenting an element

> Attach supporting files — with a comment on each — to any product, model, material, dataset, or electricity element

Every element has a **Documentation** section for supporting files: the rationale behind a dataset choice, what else you considered, a supplier's declaration, a lab report. Anything that explains a modeling decision but isn't itself a Product sheet.

Before this existed the Product sheet slot was the only general-purpose place to put such a file, and datasets never saw it at all. Documentation is separate from both, and every element type has it.

## Adding a file

<Steps>
  <Step title="Open the element's settings">
    From an element's page, click the **Settings** gear in the header.
  </Step>

  <Step title="Find the Documentation section">
    It's under **Product info** for products, models, sub-models, materials, and electricity, and under **Dataset info** for datasets — in both cases below the element's own fields.
  </Step>

  <Step title="Add the file">
    Click **Add documentation**, or drag a file onto it. There's no limit on how many you attach.
  </Step>

  <Step title="Say why it's there">
    Each row has a comment field — *"Add a comment"* — next to the filename. Type up to 1,000 characters; it saves as you go, no separate save step.
  </Step>
</Steps>

Accepted file types are `pdf`, `doc`, `docx`, `xls`, `xlsx` and `csv`, plus images (`png`, `jpg`, `svg`, `webp`, `avif`, `heif`, `heic`). Each file can be up to 50 MB. Click a filename to preview it; hover a row and use the delete icon to remove it.

## Who can see it

**Documentation stays inside your company.** Unlike a product image or a Product sheet, a documentation file does not inherit the element's visibility — publishing a product, sharing it by link, or exposing it over the API does not expose its documentation. It's the same expectation as the **Notes (for internal use)** field it sits above.

That also means the documentation you see on an element is your own company's. A supplier attaching their reasoning to an element they share with you does not send it to you along with the element.

## Where it helps

Verification is the usual reason. A verifier reviewing your model wants to know why a particular dataset was chosen and what the alternatives were — attaching that reasoning to the element itself keeps it with the model instead of in a side spreadsheet that has to be found again next cycle.