Coding tools

Continue

Add Deference to Continue as an OpenAI provider with a custom base URL.

Continue treats Deference as an openai provider with its own apiBase. It speaks Chat Completions, so the base URL is https://deference.si/v1.

Set up

Create a key in API keys and add it to ~/.continue/.env as a line with no quotes.

DEFERENCE_API_KEY=sk-df-...

Add the model to ~/.continue/config.yaml (on Windows, %USERPROFILE%\.continue\config.yaml).

name: Deference
version: 0.0.1
schema: v1
models:
  - name: Claude Sonnet 5.5 (Deference)
    provider: openai
    model: anthropic/claude-sonnet-5.5
    apiBase: https://deference.si/v1
    apiKey: ${{ secrets.DEFERENCE_API_KEY }}
    roles:
      - chat
      - edit
      - apply
    capabilities:
      - tool_use
    defaultCompletionOptions:
      contextLength: 200000
      maxTokens: 32000

Restart your editor so the extension reads the .env file, then pick the model in the chat dropdown.

The extension cannot see variables you export in a terminal. Use ~/.continue/.env for a key available across projects. Continue also reads project .env and .continue/.env files before the global file, so an old project value can override it. Keep every file containing keys out of version control. The cn command-line tool also reads process environment variables. See Continue's secret lookup order.

Verify

Send a chat message, then open Activity. The request is the top row, with the model you chose.

Continue has no status command. If the model does not respond, open the editor's developer tools and read the console. In VS Code that is Developer: Toggle Developer Tools.

Pick a model

The dropdown shows name. model is the id sent to Deference, slashes included.
Add capabilities: [tool_use]. Continue only turns on Agent mode for ids it recognizes, and anthropic/... ids are not among them. Add image_input for models that read images.
Continue sends ids that start with openai/gpt-5 to the Responses API by default. Deference serves both formats. Add useResponsesApi: false to a model to keep it on Chat Completions.

Troubleshooting

You see	Cause	Fix
`401 invalid_api_key`	The secret did not resolve	Check the name in `~/.continue/.env` matches `secrets.DEFERENCE_API_KEY`, then restart the editor
The model does not appear	The YAML is invalid	Check the indentation and the `schema` line
Agent mode is unavailable	Continue does not know the model supports tools	Add `capabilities: [tool_use]`
`404`	`apiBase` lacks `/v1`	Use `https://deference.si/v1`
`404 model_not_found`	`model` differs from the catalog	Copy the id from the Models page
A request goes to the wrong endpoint	Continue picked the Responses API	Set `useResponsesApi: false`