What is chunking?
Chunking divides cleaned content into pieces of a set character length with a set overlap — 1200 and 120 by default, both tunable per call. Each chunk is embedded and stored separately, so retrieval returns the passage that answered the query rather than the whole document.
Why it matters
Chunk size is the main quality dial in a retrieval pipeline. Too large and a match returns mostly irrelevant text; too small and the passage loses the context that made it meaningful. Overlap is what stops an answer that straddles a boundary from being lost.