Third-party host self-serve onboarding

[Li-Sanze]

Third-party host self-serve onboarding

Why

Right now, adding support for a new AI host is still too author-driven.

Sopify already works across multiple hosts, but onboarding a new host still depends too much on manual adapter work, repo-specific knowledge, and one-off validation.

That does not scale well.

What we want instead is a self-serve path:

• a host can follow one documented convention
• verify whether it meets the minimum Sopify contract
• and get to a usable Sopify workflow without requiring a deep custom integration first

Audience

This work is primarily for contributors who want to help onboard additional AI hosts. End users benefit from the result, but they are not the primary audience for this workflow.

Goal

Define and validate the minimum path for a third-party host to adopt Sopify.

This should make it clear:

• what a host must support
• what is optional
• how to verify the integration
• where the current boundary is between convention-only, payload-capable, and deep-verified hosts

Scope

In scope:

• document the minimum onboarding path for a new host
• define a practical quickstart for third-party hosts
• provide a compliance check or smoke path
• validate the path with at least one non-deep host example

Out of scope:

• installer tooling changes (this iteration focuses on defining and validating the minimum onboarding path first)
• building a full deep adapter for every new host
• host-specific UI work
• expanding runtime-specific behavior
• reopening retired host lines unless the self-serve path proves insufficient

Acceptance criteria

• a new host can follow a documented quickstart
• the host can verify whether it satisfies the minimum Sopify contract
• at least one non-deep host can complete the path successfully
• the result clarifies what should remain convention-level vs host-specific

Checklist

• define the minimum contract for a third-party host
• document a self-serve quickstart path
• provide a practical compliance check or smoke path
• validate the path with at least one non-deep host example
• document the boundary between convention-level support and host-specific work

Notes

This is a productization step for host onboarding, not a commitment to support every host immediately.

This issue serves as a top-level direction / epic. Follow-up work will likely split into sub-issues that individual contributors can pick up.