ChatGPT

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Native Soil is an official ChatGPT app · it's in ChatGPT's app directory, so you add it in one click.

Add Native Soil in ChatGPT →

Opens the app in ChatGPT's directory. Click Add there and that is the whole setup.

1. Open the Native Soil app in ChatGPT's directory using the button above and click Add. No client id, secret, or connector URL to paste · the directory listing wires it up for you.

2. Sign in when prompted · with Google, or with email and password · then run soil info to confirm. It returns your project and handover counts, which proves ChatGPT reached Soil and is authenticated.

Alternative: add it as a custom connector

You don't need this · the app directory is the one-click way in. But if you or your organization prefer the raw MCP URL, ChatGPT's Developer mode still lets you add Soil as a custom connector:

1. In ChatGPT, open Settings → Connectors and, under Advanced settings, turn on Developer mode. This is what lets you add a custom MCP connector by URL.

2. Back on Connectors, add a custom connector named "Soil" with the Soil MCP URL. You don't supply a client id or secret · Soil's OAuth bridge does Dynamic Client Registration:

   https://mcp.nativesoil.dev/mcp/soil

3. Sign in when prompted · with Google, or with email and password · then run soil info to confirm.

Get full-project saves

ChatGPT only shares what you allow it to. In the Soil connector's settings, under Preferences, turn on Reference memories and chats. This lets ChatGPT pass your project's accumulated context to Soil, so a save captures the whole project · its locked decisions, structure, and conventions · not only the visible chat. With it off, Soil saves just what is in the current thread: an honest handover, but a thin one. It is the single highest-leverage setting for save quality in ChatGPT, so turn it on before your first real save.

If Soil's tools go missing in a long chat

In a very long or old conversation, ChatGPT can stop exposing a connector's tools to that specific chat · the model will say the Soil tools are not available here, or that it cannot run soil info. This is a ChatGPT limitation in how it carries connectors across long chats, not a Soil outage.

Soil fails safe when this happens: it never shows a fabricated "Saved" card. A save counts only when the tool returns a numeric #NNN load code · if you did not get a #NNN, it did not save, no matter what the chat says. Your soil list (and the console) is the source of truth: if it is not there, it did not save.

The fix is simple: start a new chat · the tools return immediately · and run your save there. Saving early and often, under stable #names, keeps your project's continuity safe well before a chat ever grows that long.

If the thread still holds context you need and can't easily recreate, you can rescue it instead of abandoning it: Rescue a dead ChatGPT thread walks through running a prompt in the stuck thread and pasting ChatGPT's reply into Soil's Import page, which turns it into a normal handover with its own #NNN load code.

Use Soil

The commands are the same in every client · same grammar, same account. You type them in plain language in the conversation; the model calls the matching Soil tool. @ says where, # says which:

soil save                       save this conversation as a graded handover
soil save #my-name              save under your own name · kept, never overwritten
soil save #my-name @project     add to a shared project · either order
soil list                       your handovers · soil list @project for a team
soil load #001                  load by exact code · by name: soil load #my-thread
soil load @project              whole-project restore · #NNN or #name for one thread
soil info                       your account status · the connection check

Save in this client, load in any other. See the soil commands for details and the reference for every form.