CrestApps - Orchard Core

CrestApps provides a collection of open-source modules designed to enhance Orchard Core, a powerful application framework built on ASP.NET Core.

📖 Documentation

For detailed guides, tutorials, and API references, visit the CrestApps Orchard Core Documentation.

The documentation covers:

• Getting Started — Installation and setup
• AI Suite — One place for AI integrations and solutions across chat, orchestration, management, RAG, MCP, A2A, and automation
• AI Providers — Configuring OpenAI, Azure, Ollama, and more
• Consuming AI Services — Programmatic usage via code
• MCP — Model Context Protocol client and server support
• Omnichannel — SMS, Email, and multi-channel communication
• Changelog — Release notes and migration guides

Table of Contents

• Overview
• Project Structure
  • Example Structure
• Available Modules
  • Artificial Intelligence Suite
    • AI Module
    • AI Chat Module
    • AI Chat Interactions Module
    • AI Copilot Orchestrator Module
    • AI Data Sources Module
    • Orchard Core AI Agent Module
    • Model Context Protocol (MCP) Module
    • Azure OpenAI Module
    • OpenAI Module
    • Azure AI Inference Module
    • Ollama Module
  • Omnichannel Suite
    • Omnichannel (Orchestrator)
    • Omnichannel Management (Mini-CRM)
    • SMS Omnichannel Automation (AI)
    • Omnichannel (Azure Event Grid)
  • Standard Modules
    • Users Module
    • SignalR Module
    • Enhanced Roles Module
    • Content Access Control Module
    • Resources Module
    • CrestApps Recipes Module
• Getting Started
  • Running Locally
• Package Management
  • Production Packages
  • Preview Package Feed
  • Adding the Preview Feed
    • In Visual Studio
    • Via NuGet.config
• Contributing
• License

Overview

Orchard Core offers a flexible and scalable foundation for building dynamic, data-driven websites and applications. CrestApps modules are developed to further improve this framework, focusing on:

• Modularity – Independent modules allow for seamless integration based on project requirements.
• Security – Designed following industry best practices to ensure application safety.
• Performance – Optimized for speed and efficiency to maximize Orchard Core's potential.

Project Structure

The CrestApps repository is organized for clarity and ease of use. You can find all modules in the src/Modules folder, with each structured for independent usage and configuration.

• Modules Folder: Contains all CrestApps modules. Each module includes a README.md file with setup and integration details.

Example Structure:

src/
└── Modules/
    ├── CrestApps.OrchardCore.Users/
    │   ├── README.md
    │   ├── Manifest.cs
    │   ├── ...
    └── OtherModules/
        ├── README.md
        ├── ...

To get started with any module, refer to the documentation site for detailed setup instructions.

Available Modules

You can install individual modules into your web project as needed, or install the CrestApps.OrchardCore.Cms.Core.Targets package to include all modules at once.

Artificial Intelligence Suite

The CrestApps AI Suite is a comprehensive and extensible AI ecosystem built on Orchard Core, designed to unify and streamline AI integration and management. It combines provider integrations, flexible deployment and connection management, AI profiles, and advanced orchestration into a cohesive platform.

The suite enables highly customizable chat experiences, along with robust prompt and tool management, retrieval workflows, and long-term memory capabilities. It also supports MCP and Agent-to-Agent integrations, delivering a powerful foundation for building intelligent, interconnected systems—all seamlessly managed within the Orchard Core admin experience.

AI Module

Provides the foundation for the AI ecosystem, including shared AI services, orchestration infrastructure, profile management, connection and deployment management, and site-level AI settings. See the AI Services documentation for more details.

AI Chat Module

Provides interface for interacting with AI chat models like ChatGPT and others. See the AI Chat documentation for more details.

AI Chat Interactions Module

Enables ad-hoc AI chat experiences with configurable parameters, document upload, and RAG (Retrieval Augmented Generation) support. Users can chat with AI models without predefined profiles and upload documents to chat against their own data. See the AI Chat Interactions documentation for more details.

Extension modules:

• AI Documents - Document processing foundation with features for Chat Interaction documents and AI Profile documents
• AI Documents (PDF) - PDF document support
• AI Documents (OpenXml) - Word, Excel, PowerPoint support
• AI Documents (Azure AI Search) - Azure AI Search provider for documents
• AI Documents (Elasticsearch) - Elasticsearch provider for documents

AI Copilot Orchestrator Module

Provides a GitHub Copilot SDK-based orchestrator as an alternative to the default Progressive Tool Orchestrator. See the Copilot Integration documentation for more details.

AI Data Sources Module

Provides provider-agnostic Data Sources (RAG) management, knowledge base indexing, early RAG, and the DataSourceSearch tool. See the Data Sources documentation.

Provider modules:

• AI Data Sources - Elasticsearch
• AI Data Sources - Azure AI Search

Orchard Core AI Agent Module

Enhances the AI Module by providing AI Agents to perform tasks on your Orchard Core site. See the Orchard Core Agent documentation for more details.

Model Context Protocol (MCP) Module

Provides support for the Model Context Protocol (MCP) and contains multiple features:

• MCP Client — Client-side components to connect to remote MCP servers. See the MCP Client Integration documentation.
• MCP Server — Enables Orchard Core to act as an MCP server. See the MCP Server documentation.

Azure OpenAI Module

Extends the AI Module by integrating Azure OpenAI services. See the Azure OpenAI documentation.

OpenAI Module

Extends the AI Module by integrating OpenAI-powered services. You can connect to any provider that adheres to OpenAI standard. See the OpenAI documentation for more details.

Azure AI Inference Module

Extends the AI Module by integrating Azure AI Inference services. See the Azure AI Inference documentation.

Ollama Module

Extends the AI Module by integrating any Ollama model. See the Ollama documentation.

Omnichannel Suite

The Omnichannel suite provides a unified communication and activity orchestration layer across channels (SMS, Email, Phone, and more), with a mini-CRM UI and optional AI-driven automation.

Omnichannel (Orchestrator)

The foundation of all communication channels. Provides the core orchestration services and generic webhook entry points. See the Omnichannel documentation.

Omnichannel Management (Mini-CRM)

A mini-CRM that lets you manage contacts, subjects, campaigns, dispositions, activities, and activity batches, and drive next-activity behavior via Orchard Core Workflows. See the Omnichannel Management documentation.

SMS Om