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betalgo/openai
.NET library for the OpenAI service API by Betalgo Ranul
A community-maintained .NET SDK for the OpenAI API, predating OpenAI's own official C# library. It covers the full API surface including chat, assistants, images, audio, embeddings, and the Realtime API. Aimed at .NET developers who want OpenAI integration with DI-friendly setup and don't want to roll their own HTTP client.
DI integration is first-class — `AddOpenAIService()` works cleanly with the standard `IServiceCollection` pattern. Broad API coverage including Realtime, batch, fine-tuning, and vector stores, which the official SDK lagged on for a while. The new Contracts project (`Betalgo.Ranul.OpenAI.Contracts`) separates request/response models from the implementation, which is the right call for library design. The openapi-split directory suggests they're generating types from the official OpenAI spec rather than hand-authoring them, which keeps the models accurate.
OpenAI now ships its own official C# SDK, which makes this library's long-term value proposition unclear — you're betting on a community maintainer keeping pace with a vendor who controls the spec. The package rename from `Betalgo.OpenAI` to `Betalgo.Ranul.OpenAI` mid-project is a breaking namespace change that will cause pain in existing codebases. The README explicitly warns that many methods are untested and undocumented, which is an honest but alarming admission for a library wrapping a paid API where silent failures cost money. The Contracts migration is still partial as of 9.2.0, meaning the codebase is in a transitional state with both old and new model types in play simultaneously.