Templates
This chapter was written from the product's source code and has not yet been checked by a person on a running Cogneris. If what you see on screen differs, the screen is right — please tell your Cogneris contact so the chapter can be corrected.
A template describes one type of document your company receives — an invoice, an identity card, a proof of address — through sample documents and a list of fields to extract. This chapter covers the template list, the New Template screen, the sample documents a template learns from, and the statuses a template goes through until it is published and used by classification, by Workflow and by the Cogneris API. Defining the fields and saving (publishing) the template happens in the editor, described in Template schema.
| How to get here | Templates in the Vision menu. Add New Template on the list opens New Template. The Playground also offers Create Template when a document matches none of your templates. |
| Who can use it | Members whose company membership is active and includes access to Vision. The Vision service checks this live on every template request and refuses it when the check cannot be made. See Who can use what in the Vision administration overview. |
| Content status | From source; not observed (vision-fe 0b724a0, vision-be fce7fcc, 2026-10-22) |
In the Vision service a template is called a classifier: the API paths, the service messages and the Workflow logs use that word. It is the same object.
Template list
Header Templates, with the subtitle Manage and organize your extraction templates. The list shows every template of your company, newest first, as cards.
Fields
| Field | What it does | Required | Format / values | Default | Validation messages |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Search (placeholder Search templates...) | Keeps the cards whose title or description contains the text. | No | Free text; case is ignored. Filters as you type, in the browser. | Empty | — |
| Filter by Status | Keeps the cards in one status. | No | Filter by Status (all), Draft, Processing, Finished | Filter by Status (all) | — |
The status filter has one option per status: Draft, Queued, Processing (also covers provisioning), Training, Finished and Error.
What a card shows
| Element | What it shows |
|---|---|
| Thumbnail | The first page of the template's first sample document (PDF or image). When it cannot be shown — no file, or the preview link expired — a document icon is shown instead. |
| Title | The template's title. Click the card to open the template in the editor, on its Schema tab. |
| Pencil (Edit name) | Shown only for a Draft template. See Rename a template. |
| Information button | Opens a small panel with Created by (the user who created the template) and Created at (the creation date, in your browser's date format). Click it again to close it. |
| Status dot | One coloured dot; point at it to read the status name. Grey: Draft. Amber (animated): Processing or Queued. Green: Training or Finished — see Statuses for why Training is green. Red: Error. |
| Processing with an hourglass | Shown next to the dot while the template is being provisioned (Processing or Queued). |
| N file / N files | Number of sample documents. Hidden when there are none. |
| Engine mark | A small round mark, titled Cogneris AI, shown whenever the template records an engine — whichever engine it is. |
Pointing at a card shows its action icons in the top-right corner: Reprocess (only when the template is stuck or failed) and Delete template.
Live status
While a template is being provisioned, the list follows it live: the dot turns green or red the moment the Vision service finishes, without reloading. When Vision is embedded in the platform, each status change is also announced in the platform's notification bell; the text of those notifications is the service's own, and some of it is in Portuguese. If the live connection cannot be opened, the list instead re-reads itself every 5 seconds, and only while at least one template is Processing or Queued.
Empty states
| What you see | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Six grey placeholder cards | The list is loading. |
| Manage and organize your extraction templates and no cards | Your company has no template yet — or the list could not be read: the screen does not distinguish the two. Reload the page if you expect templates. |
| No templates found matching your search. and Clear filters | The search text or the status filter hides every card. Clear filters empties both. |
Buttons and actions
| Button | What happens | Who | Reversible? |
|---|---|---|---|
| Add New Template | Opens New Template. | Members with Vision access | — |
| A card | Opens the template editor on the Schema tab. | Members with Vision access | — |
| Edit name (pencil) | Turns the title into a text box. | Members with Vision access; Draft templates only | Yes — rename again |
| Information button | Shows Created by and Created at. | Members with Vision access | — |
| Reprocess | Starts provisioning again. While it runs the tooltip reads Reprocessing.... See Reprocess a template. | Members with Vision access; shown for Processing and Error | No — the template goes back to Processing |
| Delete template | Asks for confirmation, then deletes. See Delete a template. | Members with Vision access | No |
| Clear filters | Empties the search and the status filter. | Anyone on the screen | Yes |
Statuses
A template is always in one of six statuses. The service decides the status; you cannot set it directly.
| Status | Dot | Meaning | Takes part in classification? | Accepted by the Cogneris API? |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Draft | Grey | Created, with its sample documents, but never saved in the editor. Nothing has been provisioned. Every template starts here. | No | No |
| Processing | Amber | Saved; the service is provisioning it — reading the samples and building what classification needs. Also the status while a sample change is being applied. | Not yet | No |
| Queued | Amber | Google Document AI engine only: the training request was refused because the engine's training capacity was busy. The service retries on its own every 15 minutes until training starts. | Not yet | No |
| Training | Green | Google Document AI engine only: the engine has accepted the template and is importing the samples and training. The service treats the template as ready to use at this point (its notification says so) and finishes on its own. | Decided by the engine while it trains | No — the API waits for Finished |
| Finished | Green | Provisioned and published. | Yes | Yes |
| Error | Red | Provisioning failed — for example the samples could not be read or imported, or the engine refused the training. | No | No |
From Draft to Finished
- Create the template with at least one sample document on New Template. It is created as Draft, and you land in the editor.
- Define the fields and save in the editor — see Template schema. Saving stores the field schema and, unless the template is already Training or Finished, starts provisioning: the template moves to Processing.
- Provisioning runs in the background. Its path depends on the engine your company uses:
- Cogneris engine (the default): the service reads the sample and writes the template's entry in your company's classification catalogue, then sets Finished — or Error if anything fails.
- Google Document AI engine: the service creates the dataset and labels on the engine, sets Training, imports the samples and trains. When training cannot start because the engine is busy, the template is Queued and retried every 15 minutes. When training completes, Finished; on failure, Error.
- Saving again a template that is already Training or Finished stores the new schema but does not provision again.
Which engine is used is a setting of the Vision service; the engine is recorded on the template when it is created.
Published templates and versions
A Finished template is published: its identifier is a public contract that Workflow processes and API callers rely on. The service therefore protects it:
| On a Finished template | Result |
|---|---|
| Change the title | Refused: A published classifier is immutable. Create a new classifier to publish a changed template. The list also hides the pencil. |
| Add or remove a sample document | Refused. The service answers as if the template did not exist (Classifier not found. / Classifier file not found.). |
| Reprocess | Refused with the same published classifier is immutable message. The list does not offer Reprocess for it. |
| Change the field schema | Allowed, in place. Each change that alters the definition records a new version of the template (1, 2, 3 …); saving an unchanged definition records nothing. |
Versions. The service keeps an append-only history of each published template's definition. Version 1 is the definition at the time it is first published or first used; each later change to the schema adds the next number. A document job submitted through the Cogneris API is pinned to the current version at the moment it is accepted, so a schema change made afterwards does not change how that job is extracted; the next job uses the new version. The history is kept as audit evidence even after the template is deleted. Vision does not show the history on screen.
To change the title or the sample documents of a published template, create a new template.
What a Draft means elsewhere
A template that is not Finished (or, on the Google engine, Training) is invisible to most of the product:
| Where | Effect of a Draft, Processing, Queued or Error template |
|---|---|
| Classification (Workflow phase and the Playground) | The template is not in your classification catalogue, so no document is classified as that type. If your company has no provisioned template at all, classification falls back to zero-shot classification and the AI names the type itself. |
| Extraction | Extraction follows a template only when classification resolved one, so a Draft's fields are not used. |
| Cross-check | The Document list of a rule shows all your templates, Drafts included. A rule whose role is a Draft template finds no document classified under that template; the role also carries the template's title as document type, so it is filled only by a document whose classified type has that same title. Expect the rule to be inconclusive with reason role_not_present. |
| Cogneris API | A document job naming the template is refused at submission: Template … is not available to this tenant. The API's template list shows only Finished templates. |
| Dashboard | Counted in Active Templates. |
Classification matches a template by its title (ignoring case, and treating spaces, hyphens and underscores alike). Two templates with titles that differ only in those ways are ambiguous; keep titles distinct.
Sample documents (training samples)
Sample documents are the real documents a template learns from. They are uploaded when the template is created (at least one), and can be added or removed in the editor while the template is not yet published — see Template schema.
What the service does with them:
- They are stored for your company only. With the Cogneris engine they are kept encrypted at rest; with the Google Document AI engine they are kept where the engine can read them directly.
- They teach classification. On the Cogneris engine, provisioning sends the first sample document to the AI and only lists the names of the others; the catalogue entry is built from that first document. On the Google engine all samples are imported and used for training.
- They are the documents you test fields against in the editor: field discovery and field tests run on a sample document.
- Adding or removing a sample after provisioning does not re-provision the template. On a template in Error or stuck in Processing, use Reprocess to provision again with the current samples. On a Finished template, samples cannot change.
- Each file is checked by the service against Vision's document upload rules (type, content and size); the maximum size is 50 MB per file. Empty files are refused.
The Create Template screen does not restrict the file picker to particular types; a file the service does not accept is refused when you create the template.
New Template
Header New Template. Create a template from a title, a description and one or more sample documents.
Fields
| Field | What it does | Required | Format / values | Default | Validation messages |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Title | The template's name. It is shown in the list, and classification uses it to match a document type to this template. | Yes | Free text; spaces, accents and punctuation are kept. Surrounding spaces are removed. Must not be the title of another template of your company. On the Google Document AI engine it must not contain google. Placeholder: Document: Invoice. | Empty | Please provide a template title. — and from the service: Classifier already exists for the subscription., Template name cannot contain 'google' when the Google Document AI engine is selected. Rename the template and try again. |
| Description | A short description, shown nowhere else on this screen; it is searched by the list's search box. | Yes (on this screen) | Free text. Placeholder: Brief template description. | Empty | Please provide a short template description. |
| Sample documents (drop zone Drag documents here, or select them from your computer) | The sample documents of the template. Drop files on the zone or use Select file. Each file appears in a list under the zone with a × button (Remove). | Yes — at least one | Several files at once; you can add more in several rounds. Accepted types and the 50 MB limit are checked by the service. | None | Please select at least one document for the template. |
The checks run in the order Title, Description, files; only the first problem is shown, at the top of the form.
Buttons and actions
| Button | What happens | Who | Reversible? |
|---|---|---|---|
| Select file | Opens your computer's file picker. | Members with Vision access | Yes — remove the file |
| × (Remove) next to a file | Takes the file out of the list. | Members with Vision access | Yes |
| Cancel | Returns to the template list. Nothing is created. | Members with Vision access | — |
| Create Template | Checks the fields, then uploads everything in one request. While it runs the button reads Uploading... and the form is locked. On success the template exists as Draft and the editor opens on its Schema tab, showing the files you just picked. | Members with Vision access | Delete the template from the list |
What the service does on Create Template:
- Checks the title is present and not already used by your company, and checks every file.
- Creates the template as Draft, records the engine your company uses, and stores the sample documents. If storing a file fails, nothing is kept.
- Makes sure your company has the engine resources it needs to provision templates later. This step runs after the template is created: if it fails you see an error, but the template already exists.
- Records the creation in the audit trail.
Nothing is provisioned yet: the template stays Draft until you save it in the editor.
Arriving from the Playground
When the Playground classifies a document that matches none of your templates, it offers Create Template, which opens this screen with that document attached and, when a type was detected, the type as the title. Review the title and add a description.
Rename a template
Available from the list for Draft templates only.
- Click the pencil (Edit name) next to the title. The title becomes a text box with the text selected.
- Type the new title. Enter or leaving the box saves; Esc cancels.
An empty or unchanged title cancels the change. A title another template of your company already has is refused before anything is sent (Another template is already named "…".). The new title shows immediately; if the service refuses it, the old title comes back and the reason is shown above the list. On the Google engine, keep titles free of google. The description is kept unchanged.
Reprocess a template
Reprocess forces provisioning again for a template that is stuck or failed. The list shows it for Processing and Error templates.
- The template goes back to Processing and is provisioned with its current samples and schema, as when it was saved.
- If the template is Training, nothing is started: the engine is already working on it.
- A Finished template cannot be reprocessed (it is published).
- A Queued template is not offered Reprocess; the service retries it on its own every 15 minutes.
Each reprocess is recorded in the audit trail.
Delete a template
- Point at the card and click the bin icon (Delete template).
- The dialog Confirm delete shows the template's title. For a Finished template it adds: Deleting this template before a pending job is processed may cause that job to fail if the template cannot be resolved. No other template will be used as a fallback.
- Click Yes, delete, or Cancel to keep it.
While it is deleted the card shows Deleting...; then it disappears from the list.
What the service deletes: the template, its sample documents in storage and, for a Finished template on the Google Document AI engine, the trained classifier on the engine. If the engine-side removal fails, nothing is deleted. The version history of a published template is kept as audit evidence. Deleting cannot be undone: to use the document type again, create a new template.
Before deleting, check that no Workflow phase, review queue or API caller still relies on the template: a document job already accepted for it fails when it is processed, and no other template replaces it.
Common problems
| Message | Cause | What to do |
|---|---|---|
| Please provide a template title. / Please provide a short template description. / Please select at least one document for the template. | A required field is empty. | Fill it in. |
| Could not upload the documents: … (with the service's text, for example Classifier already exists for the subscription.) | The service refused the request. The text says why: a title already used by your company, a refused file, a title containing google on the Google engine. | Fix what the text names and press Create Template again. |
| Could not upload the documents. Please try again. | The request failed without a reason from the service (network, timeout). | Try again. Before retrying, check the list: the template may have been created. |
| Could not retrieve the created template data. | The service answered without the created template. | Check the list; the template may exist. Open it from there. |
| Classifier already exists for the subscription. right after an error on the first attempt | The first attempt created the template and then failed in a later step. | Open the existing template from the list instead of creating it again. |
| A template stays Processing for a long time | The provisioning job was lost or is stuck. | Press Reprocess. |
| A template is Error | Provisioning failed; the notification text gives the reason. | Check the sample documents (readable, the right type), then Reprocess. If it fails again, create the template again with other samples. |
| A template stays Queued | Google Document AI engine: the engine's training capacity is busy. | Wait; the service retries every 15 minutes. |
| Documents are never classified as the new template | The template is still Draft (never saved), or not yet Finished. | Open it, define the fields and save — see Template schema. |
| A published classifier is immutable. Create a new classifier to publish a changed template. | You tried to rename or reprocess a Finished template. | Create a new template. |
| Template … is not available to this tenant. (Cogneris API) | The API call names a template that is not Finished, does not exist, or belongs to another company. | Publish the template, or use the identifier of a Finished one. |
| The list is empty although templates exist | The list could not be read; the screen shows the empty state instead of an error. | Reload the page. If it persists, check your Vision access. |
| A rename did not stick | The service refused it; the screen restores the old title silently. | Try again. A Finished template cannot be renamed. |
Related
- Template schema — define the fields, add or remove sample documents, save and publish
- Template redaction and Template agent — the other editor tabs
- Playground — try a template on a document
- Workflow phases: Classification, Extraction, Cross-check
- Developers — API keys for the Cogneris API
Last reviewed 2026-10-22 · Version 1.0.0 · Owner: product-documentation