How to use Intern

Intern reads a document and tells you what to call it.

For each document it proposes a filename that starts with the date, describes what the document concerns, and names the parties involved.

It shows its work

Every fact in a proposed name comes with the verbatim excerpt from the document that supports it, plus a confidence.

It doesn't guess

Anything it cannot back up with the document's own text goes to a review list instead.

It stays on your machine

Reading, OCR, and the AI model all run locally. Your documents never leave the computer, unless you turn on a hosted model (opt-in, your own API key).

WHAT YOU NEED

• Windows 10 or 11, 64-bit (x86-64).
• About 1.5 GB of free disk space for the app and the AI model file.
• No administrator rights. Intern installs per user.

Three steps, and one warning screen that is expected.

1. Download the installer.

   Get Intern_<version>_x64-setup.exe from the download page.

2. Click through the SmartScreen warning.

   Windows shows “Windows protected your PC” and the words “unrecognized app”. Choose More info, then Run anyway.

3. Let it install.

   It installs for your user only — no administrator prompt, no IT ticket.

Every published installer carries an attestation proving which repository, workflow, and commit produced those exact bytes. Check it with the GitHub CLI:

gh attestation verify Intern_<version>_x64-setup.exe --repo z-brenner/intern --signer-workflow z-brenner/intern/.github/workflows/release.yml

SHA256SUMS.txt, published beside the installer, catches a corrupted download — but it sits on the same page as the installer, so it proves nothing about origin. The attestation is the part that does.

The installer deliberately leaves out one thing: the AI model file, 1.19 GiB.

The first time you open Intern, a setup screen asks to download it.

It resumes

If the connection drops, reopen Intern and the download continues where it stopped.

It is verified

The file becomes active only once its exact length and SHA-256 match the manifest built into the installer, so a broken or tampered download cannot be used.

You can bring your own

Choose existing model files points Intern at a copy from another machine and skips the download. This is also how you install on a machine with no internet at all.

Or use a hosted model

Set up a hosted model on the setup screen — or the Model section in Settings later — lets Intern use Anthropic, OpenAI, or any OpenAI-compatible service (including a local server such as Ollama or LM Studio) under your own API key, with no download.

Understand the trade: the text Intern reads from each document is sent to that service. The header badge changes from Private · On this device to Hosted model · Text leaves this device for as long as it is on. The key is kept in your operating system's credential manager under “Intern”, never in Intern's files, and Test connection sends only Intern's own calibration page.

Nothing else needs installing. PDF reading, OCR, and inference all ship inside the app.

Start with one file you already know, so you can judge the result.

1. Drag one PDF onto the window.

   Or use Add files. One document is enough to see the whole flow.

2. Watch it change status.

   It goes from Waiting to processing — the row says Reading document…, then Proposing a name… — and lands on Ready or Needs review.

3. Open it and read the evidence.

   The inspector shows each fact in the proposed name — the date, the type, the parties — beside the exact words from the document that support it.

4. Approve it.

   Only now is anything renamed on disk. Changed your mind? Undo it from Completed.

Drag files or folders onto the window, or use Add files and Add folder.

FORMATS IT READS

• PDF
• Word .docx .doc .rtf .odt
• PowerPoint .pptx .ppt .odp
• Excel .xlsx .xls .ods
• CSV exports
• Email .eml
• Outlook .msg
• Plain text
• Markdown
• PNG
• JPEG
• TIFF

Approving in bulk

Approve one document at a time, or use Apply all ready. After either, a note at the foot of the queue says what was renamed and offers Undo for ten seconds; it puts back every rename that batch made. Every rename can also be undone later from Completed.

Reviewing from the keyboard

J and K (or the arrow keys) move through the queue, Enter or F2 goes to the proposed name, Ctrl+Enter approves it, Alt+K keeps the original name, Delete removes the document after asking, and / jumps to the filter. After each decision Intern moves on to the next document still waiting for you.

Send to Intern

The installer adds Intern to Explorer's Send to menu. Select documents — attachments saved from Outlook, a folder of scans — right-click, and choose Send to > Intern. They join the queue whether or not Intern is already open. A file Intern cannot read is left out and named in the window with the reason; everything else is queued.

Your organisation's names

Your own firm's name is on almost everything you file. List it under Your organisation's names in Settings, one name per line, and a document that names your firm and someone else is named after the other side and, with By first party, filed in the other side's folder. The review panel says which party was left out, and the evidence still shows it. A name shorter than four letters is too short to match safely and is not used.

Every name has a date

A rename is refused unless the name starts with the document's date as YYYY-MM-DD. When Intern could not verify the date the model read, review shows it, says so, and Use date & rename accepts it in one click; Use this date puts it in the field to edit first. When the model offered none, every date the document states is a button, with the file's own date last and labelled as such.

Spellings Intern learns from you

The document says “Contoso Worldwide, Inc.”; you call it “Contoso”. Respell a party or a document type in review and Intern remembers it. The second time you make the same change it becomes the spelling Intern uses for every later document that names the same thing, and the review panel says Uses your spelling under the name. Settings lists everything learned, with Use now for a spelling you want at once and Forget for one you do not. The evidence always keeps the document's own words.

Duplicates

A document whose content Intern has already filed is flagged as a duplicate of the filed name, rather than renamed again. Choose Process anyway to process it all the same. A second scan, a re-export, or a copy saved again is not the same bytes, so Intern also compares the words: a document that says what a filed one says, dated the same, waits in review with Filed already as and the name — on this computer or a teammate's. Approve to file it anyway, keep the original, or remove it.

Where files land

Settings has a destination folder. Leave it empty and files are renamed in place; set it and renamed files are moved there.

Arrange filed documents can sort them into subfolders by year, by year and type, by type, or by first party. Folders appear as documents arrive and go away again when an undo empties them.

Finding a document

A long queue has a filter box above it. Type part of a filename or a word from the description; Esc clears it.

In the tray

With Run in the background on, the tray icon's tooltip says how many documents need review or are ready to rename.

Intern works through the folders the Microsoft sync client already keeps on your disk.

The build published here never talks to Microsoft's servers: it ships with no deployment to sign in to, so it never asks you to sign in, holds no token, and uploads nothing. Renamed files reach the cloud through the OneDrive app you already run.

SET UP A FOLDER: THREE CLICKS

The first time Intern opens it offers to watch a folder for you; later, open Settings and choose Set up a folder step by step… under Shared intake. Nothing asks for a tenant, a site, or an account. First make sure the folder is on your disk: your own OneDrive already is, and for a SharePoint library you open it in the browser and click Sync or Add shortcut to My files.

1. Choose a folder.

   Intern lists the OneDrive and SharePoint folders already on this computer, such as Legal - Documents or OneDrive – Contoso. Use one, or browse to a folder inside it. Folders synced with Sync, folders added with Add shortcut to My files, and your own OneDrive all work. If none is listed, click Sync (or Add shortcut to My files) in SharePoint and choose Check again.

2. Say where renamed documents go.

   Intern creates a Filed folder next to the one you chose, or you choose another. Choose the top folder of a synced location and Intern makes an Inbox to watch and a Filed folder inside it, so renamed documents stay synced.

3. Decide about what is already there.

   If the folder already holds documents, Intern asks once whether to rename them too. The default is to rename only new ones.

Settings shows how the folder is doing — up to date, waiting for OneDrive to download documents, OneDrive not running, or no longer synced — with the one button that fixes each. A document whose contents are still in the cloud is never renamed or moved until OneDrive has downloaded it. Intern labels a folder you pick “Synced with OneDrive – …”, “Synced with SharePoint – …”, or “On a network share – …”, and Settings lists every synced location on this computer, because the folder a library syncs to has a name nobody chose. A network share can never be watched as your own: anyone with access can add to it.

DESCRIPTIONS IN A SHAREPOINT COLUMN

Alongside the filename, Intern writes one sentence saying what the document concerns. It can leave that sentence beside each document it files, so a column of the library can show it.

1. Turn on the records.

   In Settings, under Descriptions for SharePoint, tick Write a description record for each filed document and save. It needs a destination folder, because that is where the records live.

2. Intern writes one small file per filed document.

   Under .intern\descriptions in the destination folder: the new filename, its path in the library, the sentence, and the date, type, and parties behind the name. Never any document text. The sync client uploads it like any other file. Intern makes no network request for this.

3. A flow fills the column.

   Add a Description column to the library and create the Power Automate flow described step by step in the description-column guide. It runs under the account of whoever creates it and copies each record's sentence into the column.

Turned it on after filing a stack of documents? Write records for documents already filed in the same section writes them now. No flow? The rename history's CSV export has the sentence in its last column, ready to paste into the library's grid view.

TWO THINGS PEOPLE ASK

A plain folder on this computer works too: tick This is a private local intake.

1. Choose the folder.

   In Settings, under Shared intake, turn on Watch a folder for new documents and choose the intake folder.

2. Say it is yours.

   Tick This is a private local intake, not a shared or synced folder. That tells Intern only you put documents there, so it processes them without asking anyone who added them. The box is refused for a OneDrive, SharePoint, or network-share folder; for those, use Set up a folder step by step… (section 06).

3. Choose a destination and save.

   Renamed documents go to the destination folder.

A watched folder that is neither set up step by step nor ticked as a private local intake is treated as shared: its documents are held as uploader unknown until Microsoft confirms who uploaded them, which only a provisioned build can do. Settings counts them.

Two rules are enforced when you save, rather than discovered while running:

• Watching requires a destination folder.
• The destination must be outside the intake folder. Renaming in place inside a watched folder would make every result reappear as new work, so Intern refuses that configuration up front.

Scan interval

About every 20 seconds, and every few seconds while a file is still arriving. Scan now forces an immediate pass.

Half-copied files

A file is only picked up once its size and modified time have held still for about ten seconds, so a file still being copied is never read. Scan now does not shorten that wait.

Folders you cannot open

A subfolder this account has no permission to read is counted in Settings and skipped. Everything else is still scanned — one locked folder on a share never stops the rest.

A team Inbox that files what your colleagues upload needs a build your administrator provisioned.

In that build Intern connects your Microsoft work account and reads, from Microsoft's own file metadata, who uploaded each document — never its content. Only documents you upload directly into the Inbox, unchanged, are filed for you. Anything uploaded by someone else, or that cannot be verified, stays untouched in the Inbox. The build published here has no deployment, so it cannot verify anyone; use a folder only you add documents to (section 06).

Several computers can watch the same synced folder. They coordinate through a .intern folder inside it — small files the sync client replicates like anything else. Don't delete .intern casually; it is how machines avoid processing the same document twice.

One claim per document

First claim wins, with a time-limited lease. If a machine crashes, its work is taken over automatically once the lease lapses — about 15 minutes. Sync-based leases are best effort, not an exactly-once guarantee.

Shared work queue

By default each machine only processes its own verified uploads.

In a provisioned build, Also process documents uploaded by others accepts other verified uploaders' documents too — never unknown ones — with a two-minute courtesy delay, so the uploader's own machine gets first claim. Without a provisioned build there is no one it can verify, so it adds nothing.

Who is doing what

Name your machine in Settings under This machine's name, so teammates can tell the machines apart.

The same document twice

The shared folder remembers what every machine has filed out of it, for a year. A document someone uploads again — under any name — is flagged as a duplicate of the filed name, naming the machine that filed it, instead of being filed a second time.

Find the sentence that sounds like your problem.

INSTALLING AND UPDATING

NAMING AND THE HOSTED MODEL

DOCUMENTS

FOLDERS AND SYNC

GOOD TO KNOW

Intern checks for a newer release when it starts and every 6 hours while it runs.

The check asks GitHub for the release manifest and sends nothing about your documents: no filenames, no contents, no identifier. A found update shows a banner; nothing is downloaded or installed until you click Install … and restart, which shows how much of the download has arrived. Only a build signed with this project's key is accepted; anything else is refused. Installing waits for renames: once the download is in, the queue pauses so it starts no more, and a rename part-way through its move, even one that began during the download, finishes before Intern closes for the installer.

• To stop the automatic check, untick Check for updates automatically (when Intern starts and every 6 hours) in Settings → Updates and save.
• To check right now, press Check for updates in the same place. It works whether the automatic check is on or off.

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