Add your files

The finished example searches inside real PDFs. Before anything can read them, the files need to live somewhere Search Stack can reach — a media store.

What a media store is

A media store is file storage attached to your account — the home for the images, documents and data files your search uses. Every account starts with a built-in one called default, so there's nothing to set up. (You can also connect your own storage bucket later, and your files never leave it.)

Upload the PDFs

In the console, open Media (under Sources in the sidebar) and click into the default store. Choose Add Media and pick a file:

The Upload Media dialog on the default media store with a PDF chosen

Upload a handful and the store lists them — here are the five papers the finished example searches:

The default media store listing the uploaded PDFs, each with its content type and size

Files in a store aren't only for search: a .json or .csv file can be opened and fixed right in the console, and a synced file (like a feed's) shows its sync state here too.

Checkpoint. Your PDFs are in the store, each one somewhere a record can point at. Nothing is searchable yet — that's the next step: a list whose records carry the files.

Go deeper: Media stores — the built-in one, and bringing your own bucket in the reference.