As we get further into the New World of Workspace, and as I’m encouraging you to expand the use of KR s2s, expanded error-checking of applications is now available. One of the areas significantly affected is Attachments.

Grants.gov provides FAQs for attachments at this link: https://www.grants.gov/applicants/applicant-faqs.html#attachments

Some of the highlights:

1. UNIQUE filenames – If you are using the Subaward form or attaching multiple Human Subjects Study forms in Workspace, you may already have seen errors when files are named the same. Grants.gov and KR will look at the entire set of attachments throughout the application to validate for the unique-ness of the files. For example:
   1. If every subaward budget form’s budget justification is named simply ‘Budget Justification’, this will cause the error. (This happened a lot in the old PDF package world!)
   2. If your application has multiple Human Subjects studies, a separate form is required for each. The multiple attachments for each form are for the same information (women/children, minorities, etc.), but the attachment filenames must include some unique information (e.g., S1, Study1).
2. Filename character set – NO ‘special’ characters, please! The guidance at the link allows for symbols like @ or #, but DON’T use them. Several of them break KR PD. Keep it simple, and per next item, keep it short-ish.
3. Filename length – 50 characters or less

There is extensive guidance available in the Applicants section of the Grants.gov website … Workspace is only a part of this.