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Set up Google Cloud Project

Note:  Customers who wish to use Google services in Appian will need to bring their own Google Cloud credentials to do so.

Customers can use the out-of-the-box AI services as long as they have a valid Google Cloud account and meet the minimum system requirements. To use certain AI functionality, you will need to download and deploy additional plug-ins before you can use the Appian design objects in your application.

Review the sections below to ensure you are ready to begin building AI into your application.

System requirements

  • To use the Google Cloud AI connected systems and connected system plug-ins, Appian must be running version 19.2 or higher.
  • To use IDP, Appian must be running version 20.1 or higher.
  • A supported web browser.
  • If your Appian installation is on a dedicated VPN, the VPN must allow Google's APIs to be accessible from the application server.

Setup

You must have a Google Cloud account, service account, and service account key to connect to Google Cloud AI services.

Tip:  Appian offers fully built-in document extraction capabilities with no need to send your data to Google. If your business requires you to keep your document data within Appian, you can do just that using these built-in services.

Configure your Google Cloud console to prepare for integration:

  1. As the Project Owner, log into the Google Cloud console and select an existing project or create a new project.
  2. Ensure that billing is enabled for your project.
  3. Enable the following APIs:
    • Cloud AutoML API
    • Google Cloud Storage JSON API
    • Cloud Document AI API
  4. Create Cloud Storage buckets that follow the bucket requirements to store the AutoML Natural Language files:
    • For us-central1:
    • Location type: Region
    • Location: us-central1
    • Storage class: Standard (sometimes displayed in the Cloud Storage browser as Regional) - For eu:
    • Location type: Multi-region
    • Location: eu
    • Storage class: Standard (sometimes displayed in the Cloud Storage browser as Multi-Regional)
  5. You may choose to have two buckets: one for the training documents and one for the prediction documents. Or, you can use the same storage bucket for both. If you use two buckets, then they must be in the same regional location.
  6. Create a Google Service Account in the Google Cloud Console with AutoML Admin, Storage Admin, and Document AI Admin permissions.
  7. Create the service account key and save the file as a JSON document.

Using Google's Document AI API v1

In the v1 release of Google's Document AI API, the service is better equipped to handle more complex text content in documents, such as handwriting. Customers can take advantage of this updated endpoint by setting up a Form Parser processor in their Google Cloud console.

Tip:  Setting up the Form Parser processor in the Google Document AI API v1 endpoint is optional.

Before you get started, create a Form Parser processor in your Google Cloud Platform:

  1. In the Google Cloud Platform, open the Form Parser processor you created.
  2. Locate and copy the processor ID. You'll use this value in Appian to connect to the processor.

Then you can connect the Google Document AI Form Parser with Appian's document extraction features:

  1. In Appian Designer, open the process model used for document extraction.
  2. Open the Start Doc Extraction Smart Service and select the Data tab.
  3. On the Inputs tab, click Processor ID and configure a value so it uses the processor ID from the Form Parser processor you set up earlier. You can paste the processor ID directly, or configure it using a process variable.
    • Note: Processor ID is not supported when Appian is selected for Preferred Vendor.
  4. Click OK.
  5. Save and publish your process model.

When a document is extracted in this process, it will be sent to the new Form Parser processor you set up, which uses Google's Document AI API v1.

Deploy plug-ins

To use custom machine learning models or access a Google Cloud Storage bucket in your application, you'll need to deploy the associated connected system plug-ins:

To deploy the plug-ins for Appian Cloud installations:

  1. In your Appian environment, log in as a system administrator.
  2. Go to > Admin Console.
  3. On the left side of the console, click Plug-ins.
  4. Click DEPLOY NEW PLUG-INS.
  5. Search for and click the desired plug-in. Note that only cloud-approved plug-ins that are supported for your site's version of Appian will appear.
  6. Click DEPLOY.

To deploy plug-ins for self-managed installations, see Appian Suite Plug-Ins.

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