Overview
In June of 2021 Tiffany Tse’s team relaunched the first iteration of Shopify’s new developer documentation website, with a brand new design system built from scratch. In September, they launched updated API references, which included their opinion on the best way to showcase GraphQL reference documentation.
This is a case study in what they did, the challenges they faced on the way, and what ultimately shipped to developers.
Objective
Learn Shopify builds developer documentation, and why designing experiences for how people use something is different than generating documentation from a schema.
Five Things Audience Members Will Learn
- How their developer documentation functioned before and after the redesign
- The baseline components of the new design system
- Differences between GraphQL and REST documentation
- The process behind how their APIs are generated from Shopify’s core product
- What a designed GraphQL reference experience actually looks like
Target Audience
Designers and developers interested in design systems and GraphQL
Assumed Audience Knowledge
Some baseline understanding of what GraphQL, REST and APIs are more generally are recommended.
