elelem-openai

Alpha. It works, with known gaps. Check the known issues before you rely on it.

elelem-openai connects elelem to OpenAI. It registers the openai provider, which calls the Chat Completions API at https://api.openai.com/v1/chat/completions. Use it when you want a hosted OpenAI model.

Install #

gem install elelem elelem-builtins elelem-openai

elelem-builtins is optional but gives the agent its default tools. Requires Ruby 4.0.

Configure #

export OPENAI_API_KEY=sk-...

--model overrides OPENAI_MODEL. The base URL is fixed to https://api.openai.com/v1; there is no environment variable to point it at another OpenAI-compatible server.

Use #

elelem -p openai
elelem -p openai --model gpt-4.1
git diff | elelem ask -p openai "explain this diff"

The gem also installs elelem-openai, which is elelem with openai as the default provider:

elelem-openai chat

Unlike elelem, elelem-openai does not load elelem-builtins, so the agent has no tools unless a plugin file in ~/.agents/plugins adds them.

How it works #

Each turn is one POST to chat/completions with stream: true, tool_choice: "auto", and elelem’s messages and tools as they are. Tool definitions are already in the OpenAI function format, so the provider does no conversion. Requests use Net::HTTP with a 3600-second read timeout and a 10-second open timeout.

The response is read as server-sent events. Each delta.content becomes part of the reply. Tool call fragments are collected by index, and their arguments strings are joined and parsed as JSON when the stream ends. elelem prints the reply once the turn is done.

Limitations #

• Earlier tool calls are sent back in elelem’s internal shape (id, name, arguments), not OpenAI’s function wrapper with string arguments. The API may reject the follow-up request after a tool call; check this before relying on multi-step tool use.
• No thinking or reasoning output. Only delta.content and delta.tool_calls are read.
• tools and tool_choice are sent on every request, even when the tool list is empty.
• If a tool call’s arguments are not valid JSON, the turn fails with a parse error instead of guessing.
• No setting for the base URL, temperature, or other sampling parameters.
• Any non-2xx response raises HTTP CODE: BODY. There are no retries.

Development #

git clone https://git.mokhan.ca/elelem/openai.git
cd openai
bin/setup
bin/test
bin/lint

The spec injects a fake HTTP adapter, so the tests make no network calls.

Environment #