BYOK Guide

BYOK Guide — Bring Your Own Key (v0.4.5+)

Per-tool-call provider override for VerifiMind™ PEAS

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Overview

Starting with v0.4.5, VerifiMind PEAS supports BYOK (Bring Your Own Key) — allowing users to override the default AI provider on every individual tool call. Your key is used ephemerally (for that single request only) and is never stored.

PR: #55

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How It Works

Every core validation tool (consult_agent_x, consult_agent_z, consult_agent_cs, run_full_trinity) accepts two optional parameters:

Parameter	Type	Description
api_key	string	Your provider API key (ephemeral, never stored)
llm_provider	string	Provider name: openai, anthropic, groq, mistral, ollama, xai

Auto-Detect Key Format

If you provide only api_key without llm_provider, the server auto-detects the provider from the key prefix:

Key Prefix	Detected Provider
gsk_	Groq
sk-ant-	Anthropic
sk-	OpenAI

For other providers (Mistral, Ollama, xAI), you must specify llm_provider explicitly.

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Usage Examples

Default (No BYOK)

Use consult_agent_x to analyze the competitive landscape for AI validation tools.

→ Uses default Gemini 2.5 Flash provider.

BYOK with Auto-Detect

Use consult_agent_x with api_key "gsk_your_groq_key_here" to analyze the competitive landscape.

→ Auto-detects gsk_ prefix → routes to Groq.

BYOK with Explicit Provider

Use consult_agent_z with api_key "your_key_here" and llm_provider "anthropic" to review ethical implications.

→ Explicitly routes to Anthropic Claude.

Full Trinity with BYOK

Use run_full_trinity with api_key "gsk_your_key" to validate my AI startup concept.

→ All agents (Y, X, Z, CS) use Groq for this validation run.

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Supported Providers

Provider	llm_provider Value	Auto-Detect	Notes
Gemini	(default)	N/A	Default provider, no key needed
OpenAI	openai	sk- prefix	GPT-4o, GPT-4, etc.
Anthropic	anthropic	sk-ant- prefix	Claude 3.5 Sonnet, etc.
Groq	groq	gsk_ prefix	Llama, Mixtral on Groq hardware
Mistral	mistral	Manual only	Mistral Large, etc.
Ollama	ollama	Manual only	Local models
xAI	xai	Manual only	Grok models

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Security

• Ephemeral: Your API key is used for a single request and immediately discarded. It is never logged, stored, or cached.
• No Persistence: The server creates a temporary provider instance for each BYOK call, which is garbage-collected after the response.
• Fallback: If your BYOK key fails (invalid, expired, rate-limited), the server returns an error — it does NOT fall back to the default provider.

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Validation Status

v0.4.5 BYOK was triple-validated before release:

Validator	Result
Manus AI (CTO T)	6/6 tests PASS
Claude Code (CTO RNA)	6/6 tests PASS
CI Pipeline	175 automated tests PASS

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