Set up GSS

Government Source Selection (GSS) is as flexible as any application developed on the Appian Platform. To ensure your application remains scalable and aligns with best practices, we have provided instructions to guide you through some of the most common changes.

After you have installed GSS, there are several configurations you are likely to perform to customize the application for your organization's processes.

This page outlines the order we recommend for configuring the default application to work for your organization after installing GSS. However, these instructions can be used to modify the application at any time.

Updates in Appian Designer must be done with caution by someone familiar with Appian development.

Step 1: Configure user groups and security

Configuring user groups and security is a good place to start with Government Source Selection (GSS).

You must know the following:

• If your organization has additional business roles not covered in the default business groups.
• What users must be members of each business group.

For more information on groups and security, see Groups Reference Page.

Step 2: Configure and set up an evaluation process

You can modify the Government Source Selection (GSS) solution to fit your organization's processes and data requirements by configuring fields, labels, and document templates.

Configure fields and UI text

Certain fields and UI text throughout the setup process may not precisely match your organization's terms. You can configure a number of them.

The following fields and UI text are configurable:

• Accept and Reject buttons.
• Contracting personnel labels.
• Tasks and Approach item labels.

Configure document templates

The solution provides an example document template that does not exactly match your organization's templates. You can add your own templates to GSS.

You must know the following:

• What templates are needed?
• What type of document is the template?

Each document template must be added to a knowledge center. Next, add each template to the document template reference table as described on the Reference Data Tables page.

Step 3: Create an evaluation approach

After configuring your Government Source Selection (GSS) application, you can create the evaluation approaches to be used during the evaluation process. The evaluation approach determines which tasks are assigned by default for each new evaluation setup.

You must understand your organization's current evaluation processes, including:

• What phases of the evaluation can occur?
• The distinct types of evaluations that have a standard set of tasks.
• All of the tasks required to complete the various types of evaluations.
• What types of tasks does your organization need?
• Which business groups are responsible for each task.
• What tasks rely on other tasks to be completed first?
• What timeframe does the task start in the evaluation process?

When users create new tasks, they can choose from: Create Document from Template, Attach Document, Review, or Confirmation.

Step 4: Set up SAM.gov integration

You must set up SAM.gov integration, which enables you to retrieve vendor data from SAM.gov to Government Source Selection (GSS).

For instructions on how to do this, see Setting Up SAM.gov.

Step 5: Set up Azure OpenAI integration

Setting up Azure OpenAI is an optional step. You may want to take advantage of Government Source Selection's (GSS) integration with Azure OpenAI which enables you to leverage AI to synthesize a combined response and final comments while completing a consensus report.

For instructions on how to do this, see Setting Up Azure OpenAI

Step 6: Set up Microsoft365 integration

After completing the initial setup, you may want to take advantage of Government Source Selection's (GSS) integration with Microsoft Office 365.

The integration with Microsoft Office 365 enables end users to collaborate on documents during the source selection process.

For instructions on how to do this, see Setting Up Microsoft 365 page.

Step 7: Configure the default AI model

Government Source Selection's (GSS) AI features use GPT-5.4 as the default AI model to meet US Government compliance requirements for federal AI usage policies. You can change the default to another supported AI model, such as Claude, if your organization requires a different model.

The default AI model is controlled by the AS_GSS_TXT_MODEL_ID_NATIVE_AI constant.

To configure the default AI model for all AI skills:

1. Go to Appian Designer > AS GSS Full Application.
2. Search for and select AS_GSS_TXT_MODEL_ID_NATIVE_AI.
3. In the Value field, enter the model identifier for your preferred AI model.
4. Click SAVE.

To configure the default AI model for a specific AI skill:

1. Under Object Type, select AI Skill.
2. Click a AI skill.
3. In the Settings section, select the preferred AI model from Model Selection.
4. Click SAVE.

Step 8: Configure AI price extraction

Government Source Selection (GSS) includes AI-powered price extraction that automatically extracts pricing information from uploaded vendor proposal documents during the Add Vendors workflow. This feature uses Appian DocCenter's extraction capabilities to process vendor documents and return structured pricing data.

Two constants control the behavior of this feature.

Turn AI price extraction on or off

The AS_GSS_TOGGLE_PRICE_EXTRACTION_ENABLED constant controls whether the AI price extraction feature is available to contracting personnel during the Add Vendors workflow. When enabled, users see a radio button to select a vendor document for AI extraction.

To turn AI price extraction on or off:

1. Go to Appian Designer > AS GSS Full Application.
2. Search for and select AS_GSS_TOGGLE_PRICE_EXTRACTION_ENABLED.
3. Select True to enable or False to disable using the Value radio buttons. The default value is True.
4. Click SAVE.

Configure mandatory pricing reconciliation

The AS_GSS_TOGGLE_EXTRACTED_PRICE_RECONCILIATION_MANDATORY constant controls whether users must review and confirm AI-extracted pricing before it is applied to the vendor's evaluation record.

• When set to True, contracting personnel must open the reconciliation page and confirm the extracted pricing data for each vendor before the data is saved.
• When set to False, extracted pricing is applied automatically without requiring manual review.

To configure mandatory pricing reconciliation:

1. Go to Appian Designer > AS GSS Full Application.
2. Search for and select AS_GSS_TOGGLE_EXTRACTED_PRICE_RECONCILIATION_MANDATORY.
3. Select True to require reconciliation or False to apply extracted pricing automatically using the Value radio buttons. The default value is True.
4. Click SAVE.

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