{"id":121,"date":"2025-05-17T13:28:17","date_gmt":"2025-05-17T13:28:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.yippeekiai.com\/?p=121"},"modified":"2025-05-17T13:40:18","modified_gmt":"2025-05-17T13:40:18","slug":"introducing-my-free-lightweight-net-9-chat-gui-for-azure-openai-models","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.yippeekiai.com\/index.php\/2025\/05\/17\/introducing-my-free-lightweight-net-9-chat-gui-for-azure-openai-models\/","title":{"rendered":"Introducing My Free Lightweight .NET 9 Chat GUI for Azure OpenAI Models"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Looking for a simple, customizable web interface for your Azure OpenAI models? I&#8217;ve developed a free, lightweight .NET 9 Chat GUI that you can download and modify. Built with .NET 9, it offers a straightforward way to interact with your models directly from your own environment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Key Features:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Free &amp; Customizable:<\/strong> Download the zipped project and tweak it to your heart&#8217;s content.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>.NET 9 Powered:<\/strong> Built using the latest .NET framework for modern performance and features.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Easy Configuration:<\/strong> Simply add your Azure OpenAI model details to the appsettings.json file. The first model listed in the collection will be the default.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Versatile Input:<\/strong> Supports both text and image input. The text input area dynamically expands as you add more lines.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>User-Friendly Interface:<\/strong>\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Convenient model selector to switch between your configured models.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Toggles to display answers as formatted Markdown or plain text.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Switch between light and dark mode for comfortable viewing.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Easily copy generated answers to your clipboard.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>A &#8220;Clear Chat&#8221; button to reset the conversation.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Solid Tech Stack:<\/strong> An MVC web application that uses Bootstrap, Font Awesome, and jQuery for the frontend, and .NET 9 with the Azure.AI.OpenAI SDK NuGet package for the backend.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Secure:<\/strong> Windows authentication is activated by default in program.cs.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>Here&#8217;s a glimpse of the chat in action, showcasing image input and a formatted response:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"622\" src=\"https:\/\/www.yippeekiai.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/ImageInputInChatExample-1024x622.png\" alt=\"Example with image input in chat\" class=\"wp-image-124\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Get Started<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ol class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Download:<\/strong> You can <a href=\"https:\/\/www.yippeekiai.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/MVCChatGUI.zip\">download the zipped project here<\/a>.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Use It:<\/strong>\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Add your models to appsettings.json.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Run the project (e.g., using dotnet run in your terminal).<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Alternatively, build, publish, and host it on a server with the .NET 9 Hosting Bundle installed. Personally, I work with it in VS Code.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n<p>It will probably only require minimal changes to work with OpenAI&#8217;s own API, as Azure&#8217;s SDK has adopted similar structures. However, this is not something I have tested.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Background<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>I have been using OpenAI models in Azure for over a year. I initially started with the Azure example app as a GUI but wanted more customization options and a .NET-based solution.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>My workplace has recently started blocking access to ChatGPT and Google AI Studio. However, calling an OpenAI model in Azure via REST is not blocked, and likely won&#8217;t be. Therefore, running this lightweight GUI locally works perfectly for my needs. I also have a monthly allocation of Azure credits, so it doesn&#8217;t cost me anything to run.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Alternatives<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>I have used the Azure OpenAI Python sample app, and while it worked okay for text input, it didn&#8217;t support image input, and I have requirements that lead me to prefer a .NET solution. It also lacked a model selector. You can find it here: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.google.com\/url?sa=E&amp;q=https%3A%2F%2Flearn.microsoft.com%2Fen-us%2Fazure%2Fai-services%2Fopenai%2Fhow-to%2Fuse-web-app\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">https:\/\/learn.microsoft.com\/en-us\/azure\/ai-services\/openai\/how-to\/use-web-app<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Open WebUI works fine and has a simple setup, if you want and can run it in a Docker container. Check it out here: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.google.com\/url?sa=E&amp;q=https%3A%2F%2Fgithub.com%2Fopen-webui%2Fopen-webui\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">https:\/\/github.com\/open-webui\/open-webui<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Looking for a simple, customizable web interface for your Azure OpenAI models? I&#8217;ve developed a free, lightweight .NET 9 Chat GUI that you can download and modify. Built with .NET 9, it offers a straightforward way to interact with your models directly from your own environment. Key Features: Here&#8217;s a glimpse of the chat in [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[49,30,48,50,47],"class_list":["post-121","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ai","tag-net-9","tag-azure-ai","tag-chat-gui","tag-mvcchatgui","tag-openai"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v25.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Introducing My Free Lightweight .NET 9 Chat GUI for Azure OpenAI Models - yippeekiAI.com<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.yippeekiai.com\/index.php\/2025\/05\/17\/introducing-my-free-lightweight-net-9-chat-gui-for-azure-openai-models\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Introducing My Free Lightweight .NET 9 Chat GUI for Azure OpenAI Models - yippeekiAI.com\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Looking for a simple, customizable web interface for your Azure OpenAI models? I&#8217;ve developed a free, lightweight .NET 9 Chat GUI that you can download and modify. Built with .NET 9, it offers a straightforward way to interact with your models directly from your own environment. 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