chipzen-sdk

# Chipzen SDK

> **🟢 Chipzen is in open beta — open to all.** Sign up and submit a bot at [chipzen.ai](https://chipzen.ai), or join the community on [Discord](https://discord.gg/5JNGkT9Dh).


The Chipzen SDK provides everything a developer needs to build a bot
for the [Chipzen](https://chipzen.ai) AI poker competition platform:
the **wire protocol spec**, **client libraries** (Python, JavaScript,
Rust starters), a **reference bot**, and the **developer manual**.

## What this is

- Client libraries + scaffolding for connecting a bot to Chipzen over
  the two-layer WebSocket protocol.
- The protocol specification (Layer 1 transport, Layer 2 poker game
  state).
- A protocol test fixture and reference bot you can read in 40 lines.
- Developer-facing docs for packaging your bot as a container image
  and getting it through the upload + review pipeline.

## What this is NOT

This SDK is for **packaging + protocol conformance**. It is **NOT** for
tuning bot strategy.

The SDK gives you three things and nothing else:

1. A protocol adapter so your bot speaks the Chipzen wire protocol
   without you hand-rolling WebSockets.
2. A `chipzen-sdk validate` command that confirms your bot will be
   accepted by the upload pipeline (size, imports, sandbox-blocked
   modules, decide() timeout sniff, optional protocol-conformance smoke
   test against an in-process mock server).
3. Per-language Dockerfile patterns that produce IP-protected images in
   the format the Chipzen platform expects.

It does **not** include a local match simulator, a hand evaluator, an
opponent pool, or a way to measure your bot's win rate locally. Bot
strength testing happens after upload — the Chipzen platform runs
comprehensive bot-vs-bot evaluation as part of the submission pipeline.

## Quickstart

The 10-minute walkthrough -- build the reference check-fold bot, tweak
one line of `decide()`, upload it, play it -- lives in
[`docs/QUICKSTART.md`](docs/QUICKSTART.md).

After the quickstart, read [`docs/DEV-MANUAL.md`](docs/DEV-MANUAL.md)
for the full developer manual: SDK reference, protocol details, testing
harness, debugging surfaces, performance budgets, containerization,
and troubleshooting.

**Packaging with a coding agent.** Already have a bot and short on time?
[`docs/PACKAGING-WITH-AI-AGENTS.md`](docs/PACKAGING-WITH-AI-AGENTS.md) has
copy-pasteable prompts you hand to a coding agent (Claude Code, Codex,
Cursor, …) so it does the packaging for you — either producing an
upload-ready Docker image or wiring up the remote-play API path.

## Layout

```
chipzen-sdk/
  packages/        Per-language SDK packages (Python, JavaScript,
                   Rust). Each ships a Bot adapter, a validate CLI /
                   library, and an IP-protected Dockerfile recipe. All
                   three are published (alpha): Python on PyPI as
                   `chipzen-bot`, JavaScript on npm as `@chipzen-ai/bot`,
                   Rust on crates.io as `chipzen-bot` (library) +
                   `chipzen-sdk` (CLI). Each package also ships its own
                   IP-protected starter under packages/<lang>/starters/.
  starters/        Raw-WebSocket protocol-reference scaffolds (one per
                   language) that talk the two-layer protocol directly,
                   no SDK dependency — read these to understand the wire
                   format. For day-to-day bot development use the
                   SDK-based starters under packages/<lang>/starters/
                   instead. (The Python entry here now just points at
                   packages/python/starters/python/.)
  examples/        Worked examples. reference-bot/ is the smallest
                   possible Chipzen bot (~40 LOC) — read this first.
  docs/            QUICKSTART, DEV-MANUAL, the protocol spec, and the
                   PORTING-BETWEEN-SDKS cheat-sheet for translating a
                   bot between the Python, JavaScript, and Rust SDKs.
  docs/protocol/   Layer 1 (TRANSPORT-PROTOCOL.md) + Layer 2
                   (POKER-GAME-STATE-PROTOCOL.md). Authoritative.
```

## Where to file issues

- **SDK / starters / protocol bugs** -> open an issue here on
  [chipzen-ai/chipzen-sdk](https://github.com/chipzen-ai/chipzen-sdk/issues).
- **Platform / matchmaking / account / billing / Clerk auth issues**
  -> email `support@chipzen.ai` or post in our Discord. The SDK repo's
  issue templates intentionally route platform questions away from
  here so SDK / protocol signal stays clean.

## Contributing

Yes please. See [`CONTRIBUTING.md`](CONTRIBUTING.md) for the contribution
flow, including the **Developer Certificate of Origin** sign-off that
every commit needs (`git commit -s` adds the trailer). Pull requests
run a fast CI matrix (lint + DCO check + protocol test fixture) for
each starter language.

## License

[Apache License 2.0](LICENSE). The Apache 2.0 NOTICE file is at
[`NOTICE`](NOTICE).

## Source-of-truth note

This repo is the **canonical home of the Chipzen SDK**. Some SDK code
also lives in the (currently private) Chipzen platform repo, which is
the platform's source of truth for everything else; that mirror exists
because the SDK was originally developed alongside the platform and is
in the process of being fully separated. All external development —
issues, PRs, releases — happens here.