What is BYOC (bring your own coding assistant)?
BYOC means a platform works with the AI assistant you already use and pay for, instead of forcing you to use its own embedded AI. You build with Claude Code, Codex, Cursor, or another assistant; the platform handles what comes after.
Why it matters economically
Platforms that resell AI generation charge you twice: for the platform and for the tokens. A BYOC platform runs on the AI subscription you already pay for, so there is no second AI bill and no lock-in to a weaker embedded model. This is a founding principle of White Ghost: build with the assistant you already like, publish with the platform.
What to look for
Assistant-agnostic tooling (a plain CLI with machine-readable output that any agent can drive), code in your own repositories rather than trapped in the platform, and portability: if you leave, you take the code, the data, and the history with you.