Tools
The mechanisms that let a model do something — take an action, look something up — instead of only answering in text.
- Tool Calling — lets a model request a specific action with structured arguments — your code runs it and sends the result back, not the model.
- Function Calling — is the tool-calling mechanism applied to one specific kind of tool: a custom function you define, described well enough for a model to call correctly.
- Structured Outputs — structured output forces a model's response to match a schema you define, so your code can parse it reliably instead of guessing at its shape.