Shopify help is not good at all

I had a lot of trouble with implementing a couple of Shopify features recently, so I wanted to give chub a try and do the whole experience again, now that I have all the knowledge of Shopify api, to see how would chub change my experience. So I installed and configure chub to claude. Needless to say it didn't help and I know now if I had used chub with my effort to build with Shopify, experience would have been the same. I am just pasting the conversation with Claude just to give you an idea of how I evaluated the thing with a single simple question:

User

i want you to tell me whats the shopify api for getting products for my store, and whats needed for the api's authentication so that it allows to get the products, is there a auth key or what?

Assistant

(ran chub search shopify → found shopify/storefront, ran chub get shopify/storefront --lang js)

Here's what you need to know:

Shopify API for Getting Products

REST: GET https://{your-store}.myshopify.com/admin/api/2025-07/products.json

GraphQL:

query {
  products(first: 10) {
    edges { node { id title } }
  }
}

Authentication

Shopify uses an Access Token. For your own store (Custom Store App):

1. Go to Shopify Admin → Settings → Apps → Develop apps
2. Create an app, grant read_products scope
3. Install — you get an Admin API Access Token
4. Pass it as a header: X-Shopify-Access-Token: your_token

Example:

curl -H "X-Shopify-Access-Token: YOUR_TOKEN" \
  "https://your-store.myshopify.com/admin/api/2025-07/products.json"

Required scope: read_products

User

according to me the admin api access token is old method and doesnt work anymore, search for to see whats the new method

Assistant

(searched the web for current Shopify auth method)

You're right, things have changed. Here's the current method:

New Shopify Auth: Client Credentials Grant

As of January 2026, you can no longer create legacy custom apps in the Shopify admin. The new method requires going through the Shopify Developer Dashboard and doing a token exchange.

Step 1 — Get your credentials

• Go to partners.shopify.com (Developer Dashboard)
• Open your app → Settings
• Copy your Client ID and Client Secret

Step 2 — Exchange for an access token

curl -X POST "https://your-store.myshopify.com/admin/oauth/access_token" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded" \
  -d "grant_type=client_credentials" \
  -d "client_id=YOUR_CLIENT_ID" \
  -d "client_secret=YOUR_CLIENT_SECRET"

Response:

{
  "access_token": "shpat_xxxx...",
  "scope": "read_products",
  "expires_in": 86399
}

Tokens expire after 24 hours — you must repeat this POST to get a new one.

Step 3 — Use it to fetch products

curl -X POST "https://your-store.myshopify.com/admin/api/2026-01/graphql.json" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -H "X-Shopify-Access-Token: shpat_xxxx..." \
  -d '{"query": "{ products(first: 10) { edges { node { id title } } } }"}'

Key changes:

• REST API is now legacy — use GraphQL
• Tokens expire every 24 hours (no more permanent static tokens)
• Must use Developer Dashboard, not Shopify Admin settings
• Need read_products scope

User

so i have configured chub https://github.com/andrewyng/context-hub to make sure that latest documentation is referred when we are developing software, and you used it, but you failed to get the new docs, so i had to correct you, and then you browsed the internet yourself and found the latest docs and corrected the mistake to get the correct info. Can you go to chub's link i gave you & read everything and tell me what went wrong, why chub failed to give you correct info, because i cant use chub if its going to waste my time. Instead of chub a simple instruction to global claude.md can be "always browse and locate latest docs for whatever technology you are about to design a solution in" and that should do that job?

Assistant

(fetched https://github.com/andrewyng/context-hub and read the README thoroughly)

Why chub Failed Here

Root cause: chub is human-maintained, not auto-synced.

Docs enter chub only via pull requests submitted by humans (community members, API vendors, or maintainers). There's no automated pipeline pulling from official Shopify docs. So when Shopify made auth changes, the chub doc only gets updated if someone notices and submits a PR.

In this specific case:

• The shopify/storefront doc had updated-on: 2026-03-01 and source: maintainer
• Shopify deprecated legacy custom app creation in January 2026
• The doc was updated in March 2026 — after the change — but whoever updated it still missed the new Client Credentials Grant flow
• chub gave me a stale doc with false confidence, no warning that parts of it might be outdated

The deeper problem: chub signals staleness via updated-on and metadata.versions, but there's no guarantee those reflect all breaking changes in that period. A doc can have a recent date and still be wrong about specific details.

chub vs "Always Browse for Latest Docs"

Honest assessment: For a fast-moving platform like Shopify — which made a major auth change just 3 months ago — chub is a liability if you treat it as authoritative. It creates false confidence.

A simple CLAUDE.md instruction like:

Before implementing any third-party API integration, search the web for the latest official documentation and verify auth methods, as APIs change frequently.

...would have caught this. It's less elegant but more reliable for correctness. chub shines for stable, well-maintained APIs (OpenAI, Stripe) where the community is active and changes are slow. For others, it can mislead.

Suggestion: keep chub as a starting point, but add a rule to always cross-check auth/credentials sections against official docs or a web search, since that's where breaking changes most commonly happen.

Key Facts for the Issue Report

• chub doc used: shopify/storefront (lang: js)
• Doc metadata: updated-on: 2026-03-01, source: maintainer
• Breaking Shopify change: Legacy custom app creation blocked as of January 2026; new method is Client Credentials Grant via Developer Dashboard
• What chub returned: Old Admin API Access Token method (Shopify Admin → Develop apps → static token)
• What was correct: Client Credentials Grant — POST to /admin/oauth/access_token with grant_type=client_credentials, Client ID, and Client Secret; tokens expire in 24h
• Root cause: chub is community/maintainer PR-driven with no automated sync from official sources. The doc was updated in March 2026 but the critical auth change was not reflected.