[7.x] Single Shopify app working locally and in production?

[cmalven]

I have a question about how 7.x apps are supposed to work between development and production.

A Shopify app has a single app_url which is used to initiate the OAuth connection. If I have this value set to my local development URL (through ngrok, e.g. https://foo-sue-tourtise-free.dev/admin/shopify/auth) I can connect to the app locally, or if I have it set to my production URL I can connect with my production site, but I can't use a single URL to connect to both.

The docs don't make it clear what the suggested approach is here, even though they are generally good about explaining where various things need to be done (webhooks, for instance).

Should I have a separate Shopify app for local and production? Am I missing something?

[AugustMiller]

The most reliable way to deal with the development-to-production transition will probably be to create a second application and perform the authorization again from your live control panel.

If memory serves, (during testing) we were able to create a new "Release" from the Shopify Dev Dashboard, replacing just the OAuth callback URL. (Verify the other settings are intact—in our experience, some carried over, others not!) You can then authorize the live environment and use that app as your "live" integration.

There is no equivalent wiggle-room for moving apps between stores, though. Once you choose the store’s hostname, it's locked forever.

I'm not confident that your long-lived development environment token will survive that change… but you can at least use the known-good app/connection in production, and create a new dev application (with a distinguishing name) at your leisure.

Making a note to add this to the Readme!

[cmalven]

Thanks, @AugustMiller! I figured that was the probably the case, and shouldn't be a big deal because I'm not often syncing products locally vs. another environment. It seems like as long as you create the localy-URL app and authorize locally first, then create a new version for production, that the approach you mentioned will work, assuming you want the current version to be the one pointing to production.

Appreciate the quick response!