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OpenServer 0.1: one file a hosting provider serves about what it sells

Browse source 
A new LogicSRC spec at /openserver and /docs/openserver. A provider puts
the table its order form already reads at /.well-known/openserver.json:
every offer with a kind, four axes, specs in fixed units, one price,
location and stock. A directory reads the provider instead of scraping
an aggregator whose terms forbid it, and the provider stays the author
of its own catalog. Only provider.name and each offer's name are
required; every other rule degrades.

Fifteen kinds cover what Anthony listed and the rest of the market:
cloud, vps, dedicated, bare-metal, colocation, on-prem, shared, managed,
paas, serverless, storage, gpu, edge, p2p and hybrid. Premises,
management, tenancy and model are their own keys rather than inferred
from the kind, because a managed VPS and an unmanaged one are the same
kind and different offers. A peer-to-peer market publishes one
descriptor whose offers are its current asks, with the operator pointing
at the market and not the peer; c0mpute is the compute case, OpenDisk
the storage case, OpenSwarm the settlement layer under both.

The first reader is nichedb.dev's hosting collection, being built
alongside this. findhost.app is named as the curated sibling.

Registered in DOC_SLUGS, NAV, STATIC_ROUTES and llms.txt, one line each.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5.1 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01Khk1C6Ese6xjdHAWLVstca
This commit is contained in:
Anthony Ettinger 2026-09-13 01:30:43 +00:00
parent 9f898d27bf
commit 06fc773e8f
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1
apps/logicsrc-web/src/app/llms.txt/route.ts
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@ -23,6 +23,7 @@ export function GET(): Response {
- [OpenProfile.md](${SITE_URL}/openprofile): One Markdown file that says who you are and where you are, for people and agents alike: identity block, accounts, topics, reshare terms and operator, discovered at /.well-known/openprofile.md or through rel="openprofile". - [OpenProfile.md](${SITE_URL}/openprofile): One Markdown file that says who you are and where you are, for people and agents alike: identity block, accounts, topics, reshare terms and operator, discovered at /.well-known/openprofile.md or through rel="openprofile".
- [OpenMCP](${SITE_URL}/openmcp): An open catalog of MCP relays: a relay serves /.well-known/openmcp.json, a catalog probes it and lists only what it found, and clients reach every relay through the catalog's REST, its own MCP endpoint, or signed webhooks. - [OpenMCP](${SITE_URL}/openmcp): An open catalog of MCP relays: a relay serves /.well-known/openmcp.json, a catalog probes it and lists only what it found, and clients reach every relay through the catalog's REST, its own MCP endpoint, or signed webhooks.
- [OpenAccess](${SITE_URL}/openaccess): OAuth 2.1 with a grant you can carry: one hub account per person or agent, apps keep their own users and link them once, grants delegate narrower to agents, and a subscription bought in one app is honoured by every app that honours the product. Reference hub at openaccess.logicsrc.com. - [OpenAccess](${SITE_URL}/openaccess): OAuth 2.1 with a grant you can carry: one hub account per person or agent, apps keep their own users and link them once, grants delegate narrower to agents, and a subscription bought in one app is honoured by every app that honours the product. Reference hub at openaccess.logicsrc.com.
- [OpenServer](${SITE_URL}/openserver): One file a hosting provider serves about what it sells, at /.well-known/openserver.json: every offer with kind (cloud, vps, dedicated, bare-metal, colocation, on-prem, shared, managed, paas, serverless, storage, gpu, edge, p2p, hybrid), the premises, management, tenancy and model axes, specs, one price, location and stock. Directories read the provider instead of scraping; first reader is nichedb.dev/c/hosting.
- [AgentSwarm](${SITE_URL}/agent-swarm): Provider-neutral agent orchestration, model routing, and cost controls. - [AgentSwarm](${SITE_URL}/agent-swarm): Provider-neutral agent orchestration, model routing, and cost controls.
- [AgentByte](${SITE_URL}/agentbyte): Agent screening sessions, policy events, and APIs. - [AgentByte](${SITE_URL}/agentbyte): Agent screening sessions, policy events, and APIs.
- [Credential Sharing](${SITE_URL}/credential-sharing): End-to-end-encrypted team vaults, plus source/target credential diffs, approval, sync, rollback, and audit. - [Credential Sharing](${SITE_URL}/credential-sharing): End-to-end-encrypted team vaults, plus source/target credential diffs, approval, sync, rollback, and audit.

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apps/logicsrc-web/src/app/openserver/page.tsx Normal file
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@ -0,0 +1,267 @@
import Link from "next/link";
import type { ReactNode } from "react";
import type { Metadata } from "next";
import { SiteShell } from "@/components/site-shell";
import { mono, pre, table, td, th } from "../openontology/ui";
export const metadata: Metadata = {
title: "OpenServer · LogicSRC",
description:
"OpenServer is one file a hosting provider serves about what it sells: every server, instance, rack, function and peer-market listing, with specs, price, location and stock, at /.well-known/openserver.json. Cloud, VPS, dedicated, bare metal, colocation, on-prem, managed, unmanaged, PaaS, serverless, storage, GPU, edge and p2p.",
alternates: { canonical: "/openserver" }
};
const DESCRIPTOR = `{
"provider": {
"name": "Northwind Hosting",
"web": "https://northwind.example",
"operator": "https://northwind.example/.well-known/openprofile.md",
"country": "NL",
"status": "https://status.northwind.example"
},
"updated": "2026-09-13T06:00:00Z",
"offers": [
{
"id": "vps-arm-4",
"name": "ARM 4",
"url": "https://northwind.example/vps/arm-4",
"kind": "vps",
"premises": "off-prem",
"management": "unmanaged",
"tenancy": "shared",
"model": "centralized",
"location": { "regions": ["ams1", "fra1"], "countries": ["NL", "DE"] },
"compute": { "vcpu": 4, "ram_mb": 8192, "arch": "arm64" },
"storage": [{ "type": "nvme", "size_gb": 80 }],
"network": { "bandwidth_mbps": 1000, "transfer_gb": 4000, "ipv4": 1, "ipv6": true },
"price": { "amount": 7.5, "currency": "EUR", "interval": "month" },
"stock": "in_stock"
}
]
}`;
const MINIMAL = `{ "provider": { "name": "Northwind Hosting" }, "offers": [{ "name": "ARM 4" }] }`;
const KINDS: Array<[string, string]> = [
["cloud", "a virtual machine on a cloud platform, billed by the hour or the second, with an API"],
["vps", "a virtual private server, billed by the month"],
["dedicated", "a whole physical server rented from the provider's rack"],
["bare-metal", "a whole physical server with cloud-style provisioning and hourly billing"],
["colocation", "rack space, power and network for a server the buyer owns"],
["on-prem", "hardware or an appliance sold or leased to run on the buyer's premises"],
["shared", "a slice of a server the provider administers, typically web hosting with a control panel"],
["managed", "a server the provider runs for the buyer, sold as the service rather than the box"],
["paas", "a platform that takes code and runs it, with no server the buyer sees"],
["serverless", "functions or containers billed by invocation or by the second of use"],
["storage", "object, block or file storage sold on its own"],
["gpu", "compute sold for the accelerator, whatever runs beside it"],
["edge", "compute placed near users at many small points of presence"],
["p2p", "a listing on a decentralised marketplace where the seller is a peer, not the operator"],
["hybrid", "a bundle that spans premises, such as an appliance with a cloud control plane"]
];
const AXES: Array<[string, string, string]> = [
["premises", "on-prem, off-prem, hybrid", "where the hardware physically is"],
["management", "managed, unmanaged, co-managed", "who administers the operating system and what runs on it"],
["tenancy", "shared, dedicated", "whether the hardware is shared with other customers"],
["model", "centralized, p2p", "whether one operator runs the hardware, or peers do"]
];
const DIRECTORY: Array<[string, string]> = [
["Fetch daily at least", "Offers change price and stock. A descriptor read once is a snapshot, not a catalog. The descriptor's updated says whether the rest can be skipped."],
["Dedupe on origin + id", "A re-read updates the row and never adds a second. An offer that leaves the file is marked gone, not deleted."],
["Keep the provider's words", "The name, the region names, the extra keys. Normalise for search, display what the provider wrote."],
["Attribute the provider", "Every offer links to its url, and the directory says where the file came from and when it was read."],
["Report absence as absence", "An unstated stock is unknown, not in stock. An unstated axis is unstated."]
];
const ABSENT: Array<[string, string]> = [
["No ordering", "The file says what is for sale, not how to buy it. Every provider has an order form or a provisioning API, and url on each offer leads to it."],
["No reviews, no trust score", "verified means the file came from the provider's own origin. Whether a provider is good is the reader's judgement."],
["No benchmarks", "A descriptor says what an offer is specified as, in the provider's words. What it measures at is another document's business."],
["No central registry", "Anyone may read any provider's file. A directory is one reader among many, and two directories reading the same file list the same offers."]
];
export default function OpenServerPage(): ReactNode {
return (
<SiteShell active="OpenServer">
<div className="band">
<div className="section-head">
<p className="eyebrow">LogicSRC standards surface</p>
<h2>OpenServer</h2>
<p>
One file a hosting provider serves about what it sells. A directory reads the
provider instead of scraping a page, and the provider stays the author of its own
catalog.
</p>
</div>
<p style={{ color: "#41505d" }}>
Every provider publishes its catalog as a web page, every comparison site scrapes those
pages, and the comparison site&apos;s terms then forbid anyone from scraping the scrape.
The provider, who wanted its offers seen, has no say in how they appear. A buyer&apos;s
agent that wants a 4 vCPU ARM box in Europe under 10 a month, in stock, reads twenty
pricing pages twenty different ways. OpenServer puts the table the order form already
reads at <code style={mono}>/.well-known/openserver.json</code>, in one shape every
reader agrees on, so an offer can be found instead of scraped.
</p>
<p style={{ color: "#5b6b7a" }}>
Status: 0.1. It covers cloud, VPS, dedicated and bare-metal servers, colocation,
hardware for your own premises, shared and managed hosting, platforms, functions,
storage, GPU, edge and peer-to-peer markets. The first directory reading it is the hosting
collection at <a href="https://nichedb.dev/c/hosting">nichedb.dev</a>.
</p>
</div>
<div className="band">
<div className="section-head">
<h2>The descriptor</h2>
<p>
Served at <code style={mono}>/.well-known/openserver.json</code>. Only{" "}
<code style={mono}>provider.name</code> and each offer&apos;s{" "}
<code style={mono}>name</code> are required.
</p>
</div>
<pre style={pre}>{DESCRIPTOR}</pre>
<p style={{ color: "#41505d" }}>
<code style={mono}>id</code> is the dedupe key: the same origin and id tomorrow is the
same row. <code style={mono}>compute</code>, <code style={mono}>storage</code> and{" "}
<code style={mono}>network</code> use fixed units, mebibytes for memory, gigabytes for
disks, megabits for bandwidth. <code style={mono}>price</code> is one amount, an ISO
currency and an interval of hour, month, year or once. <code style={mono}>stock</code> is
in_stock, out_of_stock, preorder or unknown. <code style={mono}>operator</code> is the
person answerable, as an <Link href="/openprofile">OpenProfile.md</Link>. Unknown keys are
kept. The smallest valid file is one line:
</p>
<pre style={pre}>{MINIMAL}</pre>
</div>
<div className="band">
<div className="section-head">
<h2>Fifteen kinds, four axes</h2>
<p>
<code style={mono}>kind</code> says what is sold. The axes cut across every kind and are
stated, not inferred, because a managed VPS and an unmanaged one are the same kind and
different offers.
</p>
</div>
<table style={table}>
<thead>
<tr>
<th style={th}>kind</th>
<th style={th}>what is sold</th>
</tr>
</thead>
<tbody>
{KINDS.map(([kind, what]) => (
<tr key={kind}>
<td style={td}>
<code style={mono}>{kind}</code>
</td>
<td style={td}>{what}</td>
</tr>
))}
</tbody>
</table>
<table style={{ ...table, marginTop: "1rem" }}>
<thead>
<tr>
<th style={th}>axis</th>
<th style={th}>values</th>
<th style={th}>meaning</th>
</tr>
</thead>
<tbody>
{AXES.map(([axis, values, meaning]) => (
<tr key={axis}>
<td style={td}>
<code style={mono}>{axis}</code>
</td>
<td style={td}>
<code style={mono}>{values}</code>
</td>
<td style={td}>{meaning}</td>
</tr>
))}
</tbody>
</table>
<p style={{ color: "#41505d", marginTop: "1rem" }}>
A peer-to-peer marketplace such as Akash, Flux, Golem, Salad or Vast.ai publishes one
descriptor whose offers are the market&apos;s current asks, one per listing with{" "}
<code style={mono}>kind: p2p</code> and <code style={mono}>model: p2p</code>, stock and
price updated as often as the market moves, and <code style={mono}>operator</code>{" "}
pointing at the marketplace, not the peer. In this family,{" "}
<a href="https://github.com/profullstack/logicsrc/blob/master/docs/openswarm/c0mpute.md">c0mpute</a>{" "}
is the compute marketplace, <Link href="/docs/opendisk">OpenDisk</Link> the disk-for-rent
peer, listable as an offer with <code style={mono}>kind: storage</code>, and{" "}
<Link href="/openswarm">OpenSwarm</Link> the settlement and proof layer under both.
</p>
</div>
<div className="band">
<div className="section-head">
<h2>What a directory owes a provider</h2>
</div>
<table style={table}>
<tbody>
{DIRECTORY.map(([what, how]) => (
<tr key={what}>
<td style={td}>
<strong>{what}</strong>
</td>
<td style={td}>{how}</td>
</tr>
))}
</tbody>
</table>
<p style={{ color: "#41505d", marginTop: "1rem" }}>
A descriptor is verified when it was fetched from the provider&apos;s own origin. Found
through <code style={mono}>rel=&quot;openserver&quot;</code> or a URL handed to the
reader on some other host, it is a claim about the provider by whoever hosts it, and a
directory marks it so.
</p>
</div>
<div className="band">
<div className="section-head">
<h2>What is deliberately absent</h2>
</div>
<table style={table}>
<tbody>
{ABSENT.map(([what, why]) => (
<tr key={what}>
<td style={td}>
<strong>{what}</strong>
</td>
<td style={td}>{why}</td>
</tr>
))}
</tbody>
</table>
</div>
<div className="band">
<div className="section-head">
<h2>Where everything lives</h2>
</div>
<ul style={{ color: "#41505d", lineHeight: 1.9, paddingLeft: "1.1rem" }}>
<li>
<Link href="/docs/openserver">Specification</Link>: the descriptor, fifteen kinds, four
axes, peer-to-peer markets, discovery, what a directory owes a provider
</li>
<li>
<a href="https://nichedb.dev/c/hosting">nichedb.dev/c/hosting</a>: the first directory
reading it, with providers and offers as feeds over RSS, JSON, an API and MCP
</li>
<li>
<a href="https://www.findhost.app">findhost.app</a>: a curated register of web hosts under
CC BY 4.0, the sibling from the other direction
</li>
<li>
<Link href="/openprofile">OpenProfile.md</Link>, the operator behind a provider;{" "}
<Link href="/openmcp">OpenMCP</Link>, how a directory describes its own MCP door
</li>
</ul>
</div>
</SiteShell>
);
}

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apps/logicsrc-web/src/app/sitemap.ts
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@ -25,6 +25,7 @@ const STATIC_ROUTES: Array<{
{ path: "/openprofile", changeFrequency: "weekly", priority: 0.9 }, { path: "/openprofile", changeFrequency: "weekly", priority: 0.9 },
{ path: "/openmcp", changeFrequency: "weekly", priority: 0.9 }, { path: "/openmcp", changeFrequency: "weekly", priority: 0.9 },
{ path: "/openaccess", changeFrequency: "weekly", priority: 0.9 }, { path: "/openaccess", changeFrequency: "weekly", priority: 0.9 },
{ path: "/openserver", changeFrequency: "weekly", priority: 0.9 },
{ path: "/openontology/explore", changeFrequency: "daily", priority: 0.7 }, { path: "/openontology/explore", changeFrequency: "daily", priority: 0.7 },
{ path: "/openspec", changeFrequency: "weekly", priority: 0.8 }, { path: "/openspec", changeFrequency: "weekly", priority: 0.8 },
{ path: "/agent-swarm", changeFrequency: "weekly", priority: 0.8 }, { path: "/agent-swarm", changeFrequency: "weekly", priority: 0.8 },

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apps/logicsrc-web/src/components/site-shell.tsx
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@ -17,6 +17,7 @@ const NAV: Array<{ href: string; label: string; external?: boolean }> = [
{ href: "/openprofile", label: "OpenProfile" }, { href: "/openprofile", label: "OpenProfile" },
{ href: "/openmcp", label: "OpenMCP" }, { href: "/openmcp", label: "OpenMCP" },
{ href: "/openaccess", label: "OpenAccess" }, { href: "/openaccess", label: "OpenAccess" },
{ href: "/openserver", label: "OpenServer" },
{ href: "/#cli", label: "CLI" }, { href: "/#cli", label: "CLI" },
{ href: "/docs", label: "Docs" }, { href: "/docs", label: "Docs" },
{ href: "/blog", label: "Blog" }, { href: "/blog", label: "Blog" },

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apps/logicsrc-web/src/lib/docs.ts
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@ -20,6 +20,7 @@ export const DOC_SLUGS = [
"openprofile", "openprofile",
"openmcp", "openmcp",
"openaccess", "openaccess",
"openserver",
"openstream", "openstream",
"openspec-comparison", "openspec-comparison",
"data-model", "data-model",

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docs/openserver.md Normal file
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@ -0,0 +1,219 @@
# OpenServer
OpenServer is one file a hosting provider serves about what it sells: every server, instance, box, rack, function and peer-market listing it offers, with the specs, the price, where it runs and whether it is in stock. A directory reads the provider's own file instead of scraping an aggregator, a buyer's agent reads it instead of a pricing page, and the provider stays the author of its own words. It covers cloud, VPS, dedicated and bare-metal servers, colocation, hardware sold to run on your own premises, shared and managed hosting, platforms, functions, storage, GPU, edge, peer-to-peer markets and the hybrids in between. It is maintained by Profullstack, Inc. as part of the LogicSRC open-standards surface.
Status: **0.1**. A description of a file a directory already reads, published so a provider can serve one and any directory can read it.
Slug: `openserver`
## The problem
Every hosting provider publishes its catalog as a web page, and every comparison site scrapes those pages. The scrape breaks when the page changes, the comparison site's terms then forbid anyone else from scraping the scrape, and the provider, who wanted its offers seen, is the one party with no say in how they appear. A buyer's agent that wants "a 4 vCPU ARM box in Europe under 10 a month, in stock" reads twenty pricing pages twenty different ways, and the peer-to-peer markets, where the seller is a stranger and the price moved a minute ago, cannot be read by a page scraper at all.
The pieces exist. Providers already keep this data in a database, because their order form reads it. `/.well-known/` is where a host says things about itself. What is missing is the one file that puts a provider's catalog where a reader can fetch it, in a shape every reader agrees on, so an offer can be found instead of scraped.
## Terms
- A **provider** is anyone who sells compute, storage or the space to run it: a cloud, a VPS host, a dedicated-server company, a colocation facility, a hardware vendor, a platform, a peer-to-peer marketplace. Its **descriptor** is the file it serves about itself.
- An **offer** is one thing a provider sells at a price: a plan, an instance type, a server configuration, a rack unit, an appliance, a market listing.
- A **directory** is anything that reads descriptors and lists offers across providers: a comparison site, a database, a search index, an agent's own cache.
- A **reader** is anything that reads a descriptor: a directory, a person's terminal, a program, an agent.
## The descriptor
A provider serves a JSON document at `/.well-known/openserver.json` on its own origin.
```json
{
"provider": {
"name": "Northwind Hosting",
"web": "https://northwind.example",
"operator": "https://northwind.example/.well-known/openprofile.md",
"country": "NL",
"support": "https://northwind.example/support",
"status": "https://status.northwind.example",
"legal": "https://northwind.example/terms"
},
"updated": "2026-09-13T06:00:00Z",
"offers": [
{
"id": "vps-arm-4",
"name": "ARM 4",
"url": "https://northwind.example/vps/arm-4",
"kind": "vps",
"premises": "off-prem",
"management": "unmanaged",
"tenancy": "shared",
"model": "centralized",
"location": { "regions": ["ams1", "fra1"], "countries": ["NL", "DE"] },
"compute": { "vcpu": 4, "ram_mb": 8192, "arch": "arm64" },
"storage": [{ "type": "nvme", "size_gb": 80 }],
"network": { "bandwidth_mbps": 1000, "transfer_gb": 4000, "ipv4": 1, "ipv6": true },
"price": { "amount": 7.5, "currency": "EUR", "interval": "month" },
"stock": "in_stock",
"updated": "2026-09-13T06:00:00Z"
},
{
"id": "dedi-epyc-16",
"name": "EPYC 16",
"url": "https://northwind.example/dedicated/epyc-16",
"kind": "dedicated",
"premises": "off-prem",
"management": "unmanaged",
"tenancy": "dedicated",
"model": "centralized",
"location": { "regions": ["ams1"], "countries": ["NL"] },
"compute": { "cores": 16, "ram_mb": 131072, "arch": "x86_64" },
"storage": [{ "type": "nvme", "size_gb": 1920 }, { "type": "nvme", "size_gb": 1920 }],
"network": { "bandwidth_mbps": 10000, "transfer_gb": 50000, "ipv4": 1, "ipv6": true },
"price": { "amount": 129, "currency": "EUR", "interval": "month", "setup": 49, "commitment": "1 month" },
"stock": "preorder"
},
{
"id": "gpu-l40s-1",
"name": "L40S x1",
"url": "https://northwind.example/gpu/l40s",
"kind": "gpu",
"premises": "off-prem",
"management": "unmanaged",
"tenancy": "dedicated",
"model": "centralized",
"location": { "regions": ["fra1"], "countries": ["DE"] },
"compute": { "vcpu": 16, "ram_mb": 65536, "arch": "x86_64", "gpu": { "model": "NVIDIA L40S", "count": 1, "vram_mb": 49152 } },
"storage": [{ "type": "nvme", "size_gb": 500 }],
"price": { "amount": 1.4, "currency": "EUR", "interval": "hour" },
"stock": "out_of_stock"
},
{
"id": "market-ask-8c7f",
"name": "8 vCPU, 32 GB, RTX 4090 (peer 8c7f)",
"url": "https://market.northwind.example/asks/8c7f",
"kind": "p2p",
"premises": "off-prem",
"management": "unmanaged",
"tenancy": "dedicated",
"model": "p2p",
"location": { "countries": ["US"] },
"compute": { "vcpu": 8, "ram_mb": 32768, "arch": "x86_64", "gpu": { "model": "NVIDIA RTX 4090", "count": 1, "vram_mb": 24576 } },
"price": { "amount": 0.42, "currency": "USD", "interval": "hour" },
"stock": "in_stock",
"updated": "2026-09-13T06:14:02Z"
}
]
}
```
The smallest valid descriptor is a provider with a name and an offer with a name:
```json
{ "provider": { "name": "Northwind Hosting" }, "offers": [{ "name": "ARM 4" }] }
```
The rules, and every one degrades:
1. **`provider.name` and `offers[].name` are the only required keys.** A descriptor with those alone is valid. A reader lists what it was given and reports the rest as unstated rather than assumed.
2. **`provider`** is who sells. `web` is the site, `country` an ISO 3166-1 alpha-2 code for where the company is, `support` where a customer gets help, `status` the status page, `legal` the terms a purchase is under. `operator` is the person or organisation answerable, as an [OpenProfile.md](/openprofile) URL.
3. **`updated`** on the descriptor is when anything in it last changed. **`updated`** on an offer is when that offer last changed, and wins over the descriptor's for that offer. Both are ISO 8601. A reader with the descriptor's `updated` unchanged since its last fetch may skip the rest.
4. **`offers[].id`** is stable for as long as the offer is the same thing. It is the dedupe key: a reader that sees the same provider origin and `id` tomorrow updates its row rather than adding one. Absent, the reader derives one from `name`, and a renamed offer becomes a new one, which is the cost of not stating it.
5. **`kind`** is what is sold, one word from the list below. **`premises`**, **`management`**, **`tenancy`** and **`model`** are four axes that cut across every kind, each its own key so a reader filters on them without guessing from the kind. A `dedicated` offer is usually `tenancy: dedicated`; a `managed` one is usually `management: managed`; but the axes are stated, not inferred, because a managed VPS and an unmanaged one are the same kind and different offers.
6. **`location`** is where the offer runs. `regions` are the provider's own region names, unchanged, so a buyer can use them at the order form. `countries` are ISO codes, so a directory can group across providers. An on-prem offer has no location, because it runs wherever the buyer puts it.
7. **`compute`, `storage`, `network`** describe the thing. Units are fixed: `ram_mb` and `vram_mb` in mebibytes, `size_gb` in gigabytes, `bandwidth_mbps` in megabits per second, `transfer_gb` per interval. `vcpu` is threads sold, `cores` is physical cores; a dedicated box states `cores`, a virtual one states `vcpu`, and one may state both. `arch` is `x86_64`, `arm64`, `riscv64` or the provider's own word. `storage` is a list, one entry per volume, so two drives are two entries. `ipv4` is a count, `ipv6` a boolean.
8. **`price`** is one price. `amount` is a number, `currency` an ISO 4217 code, `interval` is `hour`, `month`, `year` or `once`. `setup` is a one-time amount on top. `commitment` is the shortest term a buyer signs for, in words the provider uses. An offer sold at several intervals is several offers with a shared prefix in `id`, or one offer at the interval the provider quotes first, and a reader shows what it was given.
9. **`stock`** is `in_stock`, `out_of_stock`, `preorder` or `unknown`. Absent means `unknown`. A directory that shows stock shows when it was read.
10. **Unknown keys are kept.** A provider says more than this document names, and a reader passes it through under the provider's own key.
Serve it as `application/json`. The descriptor is a claim; that it came from the provider's own origin is the verification.
## Kinds
One word each. A provider picks the closest; the four axes say the rest.
| kind | what is sold |
|---|---|
| `cloud` | a virtual machine on a cloud platform, billed by the hour or the second, with an API |
| `vps` | a virtual private server, billed by the month |
| `dedicated` | a whole physical server rented from the provider's rack |
| `bare-metal` | a whole physical server with cloud-style provisioning and hourly billing |
| `colocation` | rack space, power and network for a server the buyer owns |
| `on-prem` | hardware or an appliance sold or leased to run on the buyer's premises |
| `shared` | a slice of a server the provider administers, typically web hosting with a control panel |
| `managed` | a server the provider runs for the buyer, patches, backups and all, sold as the service rather than the box |
| `paas` | a platform that takes code and runs it, with no server the buyer sees |
| `serverless` | functions or containers billed by invocation or by the second of use |
| `storage` | object, block or file storage sold on its own |
| `gpu` | compute sold for the accelerator, whatever runs beside it |
| `edge` | compute placed near users at many small points of presence |
| `p2p` | a listing on a decentralised marketplace where the seller is a peer, not the operator |
| `hybrid` | a bundle that spans premises, such as an appliance with a cloud control plane |
The axes:
| key | values | meaning |
|---|---|---|
| `premises` | `on-prem`, `off-prem`, `hybrid` | where the hardware physically is: the buyer's site, the provider's, or both |
| `management` | `managed`, `unmanaged`, `co-managed` | who administers the operating system and what runs on it |
| `tenancy` | `shared`, `dedicated` | whether the hardware is shared with other customers |
| `model` | `centralized`, `p2p` | whether one operator runs the hardware, or peers do |
Absent axes are unstated, and a reader says so rather than filling them in.
## Peer-to-peer markets
A decentralised marketplace, such as Akash, Flux, Golem, Salad or Vast.ai, publishes one descriptor at its own origin. Its `provider` is the marketplace, and its `operator` points at the marketplace, not at any peer. Its `offers` are the market's current asks: one offer per listing, `kind: p2p`, `model: p2p`, with `stock` and `price` updated as often as the market moves and `updated` on each offer saying when. A peer that also wants to be found on its own serves its own descriptor at its own origin, with `model: p2p` on the offers it lists there, and a directory that meets the same peer both ways keeps both rows, because the market's price and the peer's price are two facts.
A market with thousands of asks may serve the current top of book rather than every ask, and say so in a key of its own. What it serves is what a reader lists.
The compute case in this family is [c0mpute](https://github.com/profullstack/logicsrc/blob/master/docs/openswarm/c0mpute.md), the house peer-to-peer compute marketplace: its nodes are peers, its market is the descriptor's `offers`, and settlement and proof of work done are [OpenSwarm](/openswarm)'s business, not this document's. The storage case is [OpenDisk](/docs/opendisk), a peer publishing disk capacity for rent; an OpenDisk descriptor maps onto an OpenServer offer with `kind: storage` and `model: p2p`, and may be listed as one.
## Discovery
A reader finds a descriptor three ways, in this order:
1. `/.well-known/openserver.json` on the provider's origin.
2. `<link rel="openserver" href="...">` in the HTML of the provider's home page, or a `Link: <...>; rel="openserver"` header on it, when the file lives somewhere else.
3. A URL handed to the reader directly.
A descriptor is **verified** when it was fetched from the same origin as `provider.web`, or from `/.well-known/` on the origin the reader was pointed at. One found by the third route on some other host is a claim about the provider by whoever hosts it, and a directory marks it so.
## Directories
A directory reading descriptors:
1. **Fetches on a schedule, daily at least**, and whenever it is told the file changed. Offers change price and stock; a directory that read a descriptor once has a snapshot, not a catalog.
2. **Dedupes on the provider's origin and the offer's `id`.** A re-read updates the row; it never adds a second. An offer that leaves the descriptor is marked gone, not deleted, so a reader can see it was sold once.
3. **Keeps the provider's words.** The offer's `name`, the region names, the extra keys. A directory normalises for search and displays what the provider wrote.
4. **Attributes the provider.** Every listed offer links to its `url`, and the directory says where the descriptor came from and when it was read.
5. **Reports absence as absence.** An unstated `stock` is unknown, not in stock. An unstated axis is unstated.
The first directory reading OpenServer is the hosting collection at [nichedb.dev](https://nichedb.dev/c/hosting), which lists providers and their offers as feeds, with RSS, JSON, an API and MCP over the same rows. [findhost.app](https://www.findhost.app), a curated register of web hosts published under CC BY 4.0, is the sibling from the other direction: it describes providers by hand, one attribute at a time, and could emit a descriptor per provider from what it already holds. A directory that reads both has the provider's own catalog and a curator's view of the provider, and shows which is which.
## What is deliberately absent
**No ordering.** The descriptor says what is for sale, not how to buy it. Every provider already has an order form or a provisioning API, and `url` on each offer leads to it.
**No reviews, no trust score.** `verified` means the file came from the provider's own origin. Whether a provider is good is the reader's judgement, with the operator's profile and the status page as the place to start.
**No benchmarks.** A descriptor says what an offer is specified as, in the provider's words. What it measures at is another document's business.
**No central registry.** Anyone may read any provider's file. A directory is one reader among many, and two directories reading the same file list the same offers.
## Serving one
By hand, from the same table the order form reads. A provider with a database has everything the file needs; the file is that table, exported, at a fixed URL. A static site can commit the file next to `robots.txt`.
## Related standards
- [OpenSwarm](/openswarm): the settlement and proof layer under a peer-to-peer offer; [c0mpute](https://github.com/profullstack/logicsrc/blob/master/docs/openswarm/c0mpute.md) is its compute marketplace and [OpenDisk](/docs/opendisk) its disk-for-rent peer, each listable here as an offer.
- [OpenProfile.md](/openprofile): the `operator` behind a provider.
- [OpenMCP](/openmcp): a directory that also serves its rows over MCP describes that door with an OpenMCP descriptor.
- [OpenAccess](/openaccess): how a buyer's agent carries the credential it needs at the provider's order form, if the provider honours one.
## Version history
| Version | Date | Change |
|---|---|---|
| 0.1 | 2026-09-13 | First publication: the descriptor, fifteen kinds, four axes, peer-to-peer markets, discovery, what a directory owes a provider. |
## License
The specification text is CC BY 4.0. Serve it, copy it, extend it.