Core Interfaces

All interfaces live in the AIProviderConnect.Abstractions namespace.

IAIProvider

The core runtime interface — every registered provider implements it.

public interface IAIProvider
{
    string Id { get; }
    bool IsEnabled { get; }
    EProviderProtocol Protocol { get; }

    Task<ChatCompletionResponse> ChatAsync(
        ChatCompletionRequest request,
        CancellationToken cancellationToken = default);
}

Member	Description
Id	Catalog ID, e.g. "openai", "anthropic"
IsEnabled	Mirrors the Enabled flag of the provider's options
Protocol	Wire protocol resolved from the catalog definition
ChatAsync	One chat completion round trip

Deliberately metadata-free: URLs, display names, and pricing come from ProviderCatalog, not from the provider instance.

IStreamingChatProvider

Optional streaming capability — see Streaming.

public interface IStreamingChatProvider
{
    IAsyncEnumerable<StreamingChatChunk> StreamAsync(
        ChatCompletionRequest request,
        CancellationToken cancellationToken = default);
}

IModelDiscoveryProvider

Optional model listing — see Model Discovery.

public interface IModelDiscoveryProvider
{
    bool SupportsModelDiscovery { get; }

    Task<IReadOnlyList<AIModel>> GetModelsAsync(
        CancellationToken cancellationToken = default);
}

IModelOverrideStore

Consumer-supplied source of ModelOverride entries, keyed by provider id. The library ships an in-memory default populated by OverrideModels; implement this to back overrides with your own store (code, JSON, database) and register it with UseModelOverrideStore. See Model Discovery.

public interface IModelOverrideStore
{
    IReadOnlyList<ModelOverride> Get(string providerId);
}

IProviderCatalog

Read-only view over the provider definitions.

public interface IProviderCatalog
{
    IReadOnlyList<ProviderDefinition> All { get; }
    ProviderDefinition? Get(string providerId);
    ProviderResearchMetadata? GetResearchMetadata(string providerId);
    IReadOnlyList<ProviderDefinition> WithModelDiscovery { get; }
    IReadOnlyList<ProviderDefinition> WithDynamicCatalog { get; }
    IReadOnlyList<string> LoadErrors { get; }
    IReadOnlyList<ProviderDefinition> GetByCategory(string category);
}

Get returns the runtime definition; GetResearchMetadata returns the separate ProviderResearchMetadata (website, pricing URLs, dynamic-catalog and regional-endpoint flags) held outside the runtime record. The concrete ProviderCatalog additionally offers ReloadFromDisk for tooling that patches definitions at runtime.

IAIProviderFactory

Abstraction for multi-provider scenarios. AddAiProviders() registers the built-in DefaultAIProviderFactory, which resolves keyed IAIProvider instances from the container.

public interface IAIProviderFactory
{
    IAIProvider GetProvider(string providerId);
}

AIProviderBase

Abstract base class behind all four provider implementations. Implements IAIProvider and IModelDiscoveryProvider, provides SSE reading, header and auth helpers, and the centralized HTTP error translation (ThrowIfErrorAsync). OpenAI-compatible providers inherit shared request transport from OpenAICompatibleProviderBase; protocol-specific request building and parsing live in the Protocols/ wire-protocol types.