ZEO Creator is an open-source, typed contract and transformation layer for newsrooms, independent publications and creator teams. It supports live, daily, periodic and evergreen work without storing newsroom memory, scheduling jobs, possessing credentials or publishing behind an editor's back.

flowchart LR
    S[Source observations] --> G[Signals and story revisions]
    G --> D[Publication-scoped dossiers]
    D --> A[Agendas and editions]
    A --> B[Briefs, articles, commentary, newsletters]
    B --> X[External producers]
    X --> V[Artifact and editorial review]
    V --> O[Digest-bound proposals]
    O -. runtime approval .-> P[Provider execution]
    P --> M[Performance and corrections]

Why ZEO Creator?

• Evidence-backed. Every material brief claim resolves to explicit provenance.
• Continuous. Stories evolve across live, daily, periodic, and evergreen windows.
• Editorially coherent. Dossiers, agendas, and editions prevent every producer from researching alone.
• Integrity-aware. Commentary, journalism, corrections, and qualified-human requirements fail closed.
• Producer-neutral. Public briefs express creative intent; adapters own production-specific lowering.
• Publication-safe. Organization and publication scope follow every durable artifact.
• Approval-safe. Artifact, payload, destination, or schedule changes invalidate approval.
• Provider-neutral. Canonical email operations accept supplied artifacts and never own provider credentials.
• Runner-ready. The same capabilities work in a bounded agent workflow or managed runtime.
• Portable. RFC 8785 digests and packaged JSON Schemas support Python, TypeScript, and Go consumers.

Runtime integration

Version 0.5.4 installs Zeocore 0.11.0 with its shared Runtime host. Use the Runtime integration guide to export the provider inventory and prepare the real portfolio request. Creator/Core conformance is verified; Runtime's Go supervision, durable recovery and managed-agent acceptance remain separate integration work.

Install

Install the public zeocreator distribution on Python 3.14 or newer:

uv add "zeocreator==0.5.4"

or:

python -m pip install "zeocreator==0.5.4"

Zeocore 0.11.0 is installed automatically. The distribution is zeocreator, the Python import is zeo_creator, and the CLI is zeo-creator. Earlier Git-only installations used the distribution name zeo-creator; remove that distribution before installing this release, or use a fresh virtual environment.

zeo-creator doctor --json
python -m zeo_creator.examples.create_content_brief
python -m zeo_creator.examples.email_marketing

All examples run without provider credentials or network calls.

First capability

Every capability publishes typed request and response schemas, effects, requirements, examples, projections, and enumerated errors.

from zeo_core.tools import invoke_sync

from zeo_creator.capabilities.create_content_brief import CreateContentBriefResponse
from zeo_creator.registry import capability_registry
from zeo_creator.runtime import make_context

capability = capability_registry().get("creator.create_content_brief@1.0.0")
request = capability.request_model.model_validate(capability.definition.examples[0].request)
result = invoke_sync(
    capability,
    request,
    make_context(capability_name="create_content_brief"),
)

if not isinstance(result.data, CreateContentBriefResponse):
    raise RuntimeError(result.human_message)

print(result.data.brief.content_kind)    # article
print(result.data.brief.content_digest)  # sha256:...

Run the packaged example after installation:

python -m zeo_creator.examples.create_content_brief

In a uv-managed project, prefix Python and CLI commands with uv run.

Capability families

All 29 capability IDs are independently composable. There is intentionally no monolithic workflow capability. Scheduling, retries, approval state, persistence, provider execution, and reconciliation belong to the controlling runtime.

Producer contract

ContentBrief carries creator intent in a public envelope: content kind, objective, audience, source document, evidence claims, brand references, target channels, and declarative delivery requirements. Qualified content kinds are extensible—article, video.short, image.carousel, or a private namespace.

A producer returns an ArtifactManifest containing one or more artifact descriptors, byte-digest proofs, claim references, and typed attestations. ZEO Creator validates the envelope and preserves opaque ExtensionPayload data but does not interpret a producer's private schema.

The editorial kernel

SourceObservation records what was retrieved and how complete it was. EditorialSignal explains why it may matter. StoryRevision preserves a story's verified facts, disputed claims, unknowns and status through time. StoryDossier freezes that state for one publication, and EditorialAgenda plus EditionPlan turn dossiers into coherent publication decisions.

One dossier can support a breaking update, a daily briefing, a video brief, a social reply and a later newsletter section without silently sharing voice, policy or approval across publications. See the continuous editorial model.

flowchart LR
    C[ZEO Creator] --> B[ContentBrief]
    B --> A[Your adapter]
    A --> P[Your production engine]
    P --> M[ArtifactManifest]
    M --> C

Export schemas

Schemas ship inside the wheel, so non-Python consumers do not need the source tree:

zeo-creator contracts list --json
zeo-creator contract-schema --name=content-brief --version=1
zeo-creator contracts export --output=./schemas

Each catalog entry includes the schema's RFC 8785 canonical SHA-256 digest. Package, capability, and contract versions evolve independently; the compatibility policy defines when each one changes.

The authority boundary

ZEO Creator proposes destination-specific operations; each binds an explicit channel and destination, selected artifacts, content document, optional accessibility text and extension, and schedule. It never executes them. A runner resolves connection references, checks policy, obtains approval, mints bounded effect authority, executes through an authorized connector, and retains a secret-safe receipt.

Reference workflow

Credential-free examples model two isolated publications and a caller-defined portfolio containing articles, short video, image carousels, and newsletter issues. The fixture proves research, planning, briefs, artifact bundles, reviews, multi-channel proposals, and separate performance assessments without encoding any private production taxonomy.

python -m zeo_creator.examples.complete_content_portfolio

Explore reference/examples, follow the portfolio tutorial, or read the production adapter guide.

Development

make setup       # install the locked environment
make verify      # lint, strict typing, tests, references, docs, package checks
make examples    # run every credential-free example
make docs-serve  # serve documentation locally
make doctor      # verify Python, Zeocore, manifests, and projections

The repository enforces architectural import boundaries and tests installed wheel behavior. See architecture, canonical digests, and contributing.

Status

Version 0.5.4 adds the shared Runtime host integration while preserving all 29 capability IDs, independently reviewed email v4 contracts and 135 portable receipt cases. This remains an early 0.x API: pin the package and contract versions. Release publication does not establish live HubSpot/Kit interoperability; execution and account qualification belong to the host.

MIT licensed.

Email campaigns and sequences

Email marketing adds immutable campaigns, linear sequence revisions, dual-format messages, audience summaries and exact delivery packages. Runtime and Newsroom collect observations before Creator invocation; Zeocore and ZEOconnect own provider lowering and execution. Existing newsletter v1 schemas and capabilities remain compatible.

Run uv run python examples/email_marketing.py for three isolated publications. The example uses fake HubSpot-shaped and Kit-shaped hosts; it does not establish live interoperability. The public Zeocore email operation contract is still a dependency, and example operation IDs are explicitly simulated. The same example is installed as python -m zeo_creator.examples.email_marketing.