Stop 4 of 6 · Daily
Uploads
Files, screenshots and photos of paper, what Claude can read in each, and the four asks that get real value out of them.
What it is
This is the first thing that makes Claude feel like it works. Lina stops describing the problem and hands over the actual document. The paperclip and the plus button in the chat box take a file, and a photo from her phone counts as a file.
What Claude reads, and what it does not
| You give it | What Claude gets |
|---|---|
| PDF, Word, text | The words, headings and tables |
| Excel or CSV | The cells, columns and numbers |
| Screenshot, photo of paper | Whatever is legible in the image |
A few things do not come through. Formulas behind a spreadsheet cell are not visible, only the value shown. Tracked changes and comments in a Word file may not arrive. A password-protected PDF will not open. A blurry photo of a faded invoice loses digits, and Lina will not be told which ones. If a number matters, she reads it off the original.
The four good asks
Almost everything useful is one of four:
Summarise. "Give me the five things that matter in this, for someone who has 60 seconds."
Find. "List every date and every dollar amount, with the page number for each."
Compare. "Here are two versions. What changed, and which changes affect what we owe."
Turn into. "Turn this into an email to the client" or "turn this table into a list of the six I need to chase."
Vague uploads get vague answers. Naming which of the four she wants is the whole trick.
Try this
I am the office manager at a nine-person engineering firm. This is a client contract. List every date and every dollar amount in it as a table with three columns: the value, what it refers to, and the page or section it came from. Do not summarise, do not interpret, and do not fill in anything that is not written in the document. [upload the PDF]
This is a photo of a paper receipt. Read it and give me one line for our expense sheet: date, vendor, amount, and what it was for. If any character is unclear, flag it rather than guessing. [upload the photo]
These are two versions of the same document. List what changed, in plain language, and mark which changes affect money, dates or who is responsible for what. [upload both files]