Lesson 4.2

Citations and attribution

Citations turn a generated paragraph into something a user can verify in seconds.

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Overview

An answer you cannot check is an opinion

Citations turn a generated paragraph into something a user can verify in seconds. Ask for a source identifier alongside each claim and render it as a link to the passage, not just to the document.

Models do sometimes cite a passage that does not support the claim. Verifying that the cited id was actually retrieved is a cheap check that catches the most embarrassing cases.

Deep-link to the location — a heading anchor, a page number, a timestamp. Landing a user at the top of a fifty-page document is technically a citation and practically useless.

In this lesson you will:

  • Require a source id per claim
  • Link a citation back to the exact passage
  • Verify citations rather than trusting them

Resources

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Citations and attribution — Retrieval-Augmented Generation in Practice — Vertex