| name | openai-docs |
| description | Use when the user asks how to build with OpenAI products or APIs and needs up-to-date official documentation with citations, help choosing the latest model for a use case, or explicit GPT-5.4 upgrade and prompt-upgrade guidance; prioritize OpenAI docs MCP tools, use bundled references only as helper context, and restrict any fallback browsing to official OpenAI domains. |
OpenAI Docs
Provide authoritative, current guidance from OpenAI developer docs using the developers.openai.com MCP server. Always prioritize the developer docs MCP tools over web.run for OpenAI-related questions. This skill may also load targeted files from references/ for model-selection and GPT-5.4-specific requests, but current OpenAI docs remain authoritative. Only if the MCP server is installed and returns no meaningful results should you fall back to web search.
Quick start
- Use
mcp__openaiDeveloperDocs__search_openai_docs to find the most relevant doc pages.
- Use
mcp__openaiDeveloperDocs__fetch_openai_doc to pull exact sections and quote/paraphrase accurately.
- Use
mcp__openaiDeveloperDocs__list_openai_docs only when you need to browse or discover pages without a clear query.
- Load only the relevant file from
references/ when the question is about model selection or a GPT-5.4 upgrade.
OpenAI product snapshots
- Apps SDK: Build ChatGPT apps by providing a web component UI and an MCP server that exposes your app's tools to ChatGPT.
- Responses API: A unified endpoint designed for stateful, multimodal, tool-using interactions in agentic workflows.
- Chat Completions API: Generate a model response from a list of messages comprising a conversation.
- Codex: OpenAI's coding agent for software development that can write, understand, review, and debug code.
- gpt-oss: Open-weight OpenAI reasoning models (gpt-oss-120b and gpt-oss-20b) released under the Apache 2.0 license.
- Realtime API: Build low-latency, multimodal experiences including natural speech-to-speech conversations.
- Agents SDK: A toolkit for building agentic apps where a model can use tools and context, hand off to other agents, stream partial results, and keep a full trace.
If MCP server is missing
If MCP tools fail or no OpenAI docs resources are available:
- Run the install command yourself:
codex mcp add openaiDeveloperDocs --url https://developers.openai.com/mcp
- If it fails due to permissions/sandboxing, immediately retry the same command with escalated permissions and include a 1-sentence justification for approval. Do not ask the user to run it yet.
- Only if the escalated attempt fails, ask the user to run the install command.
- Ask the user to restart Codex.
- Re-run the doc search/fetch after restart.
Workflow
- Clarify the product scope and whether the request is general docs lookup, model selection, a GPT-5.4 upgrade, or a GPT-5.4 prompt upgrade.
- If it is a model-selection request, load
references/latest-model.md.
- If it is an explicit GPT-5.4 upgrade request, load
references/upgrading-to-gpt-5p4.md.
- If the upgrade may require prompt changes, or the workflow is research-heavy, tool-heavy, coding-oriented, multi-agent, or long-running, also load
references/gpt-5p4-prompting-guide.md.
- Search docs with a precise query.
- Fetch the best page and the exact section needed (use
anchor when possible).
- For GPT-5.4 upgrade reviews, always make the per-usage-site output explicit: target model, starting reasoning recommendation,
phase assessment when relevant, prompt blocks, and compatibility status.
- Answer with concise guidance and cite the doc source, using the reference files only as helper context.
Reference map
Read only what you need:
references/latest-model.md -> model-selection and "best/latest/current model" questions; verify every recommendation against current OpenAI docs before answering.references/upgrading-to-gpt-5p4.md -> only for explicit GPT-5.4 upgrade and upgrade-planning requests; verify the checklist and compatibility guidance against current OpenAI docs before answering.references/gpt-5p4-prompting-guide.md -> prompt rewrites and prompt-behavior upgrades for GPT-5.4; verify prompting guidance against current OpenAI docs before answering.
Quality rules
- Treat OpenAI docs as the source of truth; avoid speculation.
- Keep quotes short and within policy limits; prefer paraphrase with citations.
- If multiple pages differ, call out the difference and cite both.
- Reference files are convenience guides only; for volatile guidance such as recommended models, upgrade instructions, or prompting advice, current OpenAI docs always win.
- If docs do not cover the user’s need, say so and offer next steps.
Tooling notes
- Always use MCP doc tools before any web search for OpenAI-related questions.
- If the MCP server is installed but returns no meaningful results, then use web search as a fallback.
- When falling back to web search, restrict to official OpenAI domains (developers.openai.com, platform.openai.com) and cite sources.
