How-to Guides

How to Connect Claude to Shopify with MCP (Dev MCP and Storefront Catalog)

Shopify's storefront catalogue tools have moved to /api/ucp/mcp, and they won't run a search without an agent profile. In today's post I connect Claude Code to the Shopify Dev MCP and to a live store's policies and catalogue, read-only, with the commands I ran and the errors I hit.

claude-code · mcp

How to Use AI for Market Research with Claude

I gave Claude a market researcher's brief and a fixed list of tools, and it came back with a 12-page sourced report on the sim racing hardware market. Every figure went through a script that checked it against its source, and when Gemini looked for the reported ones itself, it caught one that was wrong and led the run to Simucube's company accounts. The whole run is saved as one prompt for a quarterly re-run, and a capped headless test rebuilt the report unattended in 39 minutes.

claude-code · gemini

n8n MCP: How to Connect Claude Code to n8n and Use Its API Safely

In today's post I'm connecting Claude Code to n8n two ways: calling a tool you build behind an MCP Server Trigger, and managing the workflows themselves through n8n's public API. I ran both against my own self-hosted n8n, and tested two API calls that n8n lets through without a warning: one PUT deleted a node's credential, and another put a change live.

claude-code · mcp

How to Run Qwen3-Coder-Next Locally: My vLLM Settings for Two 48GB RTX 4090s

I loaded Qwen3-Coder-Next across my two modded 48GB RTX 4090s with vLLM, and today's post covers the vLLM settings for 192k of context, and how it did on the jobs I use AI for. It answered questions on a whole 86k-token repo in 26 seconds, where Qwen3.8-27B on its 32k one-card preset couldn't take the prompt at all, and it scoped an upgrade in under 30 seconds against about 3 minutes for the 27B. But it got facts wrong, and given git tools it committed on a failing test in 2 of 3 runs.

Local LLMs · vllm

How to Build a Competitor Price Monitoring Pipeline with n8n

I built an n8n workflow that normalises 375 products from three public Shopify stores and flags any price that has changed since the last run, modelled on the product scraper I run every day. On the way, all three stores refused my server with a 429, and workflow static data never saved from the editor. So I finished the build on responses fetched from my desk, with the last run kept in a file.

Automation · shopify

OpenCode vs Claude Code: Setting Up OpenCode Desktop on Windows

OpenCode Desktop runs whichever model you point it at, and it picked up my Claude Code skills without being asked. I connected DeepSeek, GLM-5.3 and a local Qwen, fenced the permissions, and then had GLM-5.3 review an MCP server I'd built with Claude, fix it and get a release ready.

claude-code · mcp

How to Connect Google Trends to Claude Code

Google Trends can now be read by whole category, with no keyword, so I added it to my seo-audit MCP. In today's post we're connecting Google Trends to Claude Code, running the three ways of asking on real data, and having Gemini MCP draw the report, with every prompt included.

claude-code · mcp

CLAUDE.md: How to Write One That Stays Lean

In today's post, I'm taking a real CLAUDE.md from one of my projects down from 180 lines to 67. The review I ran on it came back with 23 findings, four of them serious, and I'm sharing the prompt so you can run it on your own repo.

Claude · claude-code

How to Make a PDF Report with Claude

In today's post I'm showing how I make a monthly PDF report in Claude from a CSV, and why I think it's a perfectly legitimate way to report, provided Claude checks every number against the file. A house-style Skill sets the look, and the outline is agreed before anything is built.

Claude · Automation

How to Make a Presentation with Claude

In today's post I'm sharing how I make presentations with Claude, a way of working that keeps my time on the data and my insight rather than on PowerPoint. Claude writes the storyline first and puts every number in one data file, Gemini draws the charts, and the same source builds both a PDF and an editable PowerPoint file. When next month's numbers arrive, the deck rebuilds in under three minutes.

claude-code · gemini

How to Benchmark vLLM: Find the Best Model, Quant and Settings for Your GPU

In today's post I'm sharing how I benchmark local models on vLLM by changing one thing at a time, along with the traps that quietly skew the numbers and my results from 21 setups on two 48GB RTX 4090Ds. The harness, vllm-bench, is free, so you can run the same tests on your own card.

local-llm · vllm

Claude Code Memory: How to Keep It Useful

In today's post I'm going through Claude Code memory: how CLAUDE.md and auto memory work, why they go stale, and the lint and retire-don't-delete prune that keep mine useful, plus my designs for a scheduled skill and a small knowledge graph keyed to Wikidata.

Claude · claude-code

How to set up an MCP gateway with Docker

A lot of MCP servers get pulled straight off npm and run with your permissions, which makes them a supply-chain risk. In today's post we're taking a closer look at why I run mine in Docker containers, how to set up Docker's MCP gateway for Claude Code and Claude Desktop, and what a container won't stop.

Claude · mcp

How to Use the Gemini API (and Why I Run It Next to Claude)

Get a Gemini API key, make your first call in curl and Python, dodge the thinking-token trap that returns an empty answer, and see why running Gemini next to Claude is the real unlock. Written from production - and the bills.

Claude · mcp

How to run houtini-lm on vLLM

I moved my local models off my old server and onto vLLM in Docker. In today's post we're taking a closer look at pointing houtini-lm at it, and why thinking goes off for a model served under an alias.

claude-code · mcp

How to do a technical SEO audit with Claude (and cut your SEO tool bill)

In today's post I'm taking a closer look at SEO Audit Console, the free, open-source MCP server I built, which pulls your crawl, Search Console and field data into a database on your own PC so that Claude can run the audit, the content research and the link work from it. By my estimate it can cut your SEO tool bill by about 90%, so I go through the npx install and the prompts I type, with output from a live run on houtini.com.

mcp · claude-desktop

How to prevent AI hallucinations in your work: the fact-check I run, and what the research says

A single factual error on your site and you're toast. Here's the check I run: my own MCPs find what needs checking and get a second opinion from a separate model, and the primary page settles it. I ran it for real on Saturn's moon count, a number from this page that was already out of date, and set it against what the 2025-26 research says reduces hallucinations.

Claude · strategy

Claude Code API Key Security with 1Password: A Guide to Token Hygiene

The simplest possible setup that keeps your production tokens out of AI chat windows. 1Password CLI, op run, and the conversational discipline that makes the rest of it work.

Swapping the Engine: How to Run Claude Code on Local Silicon for Zero Pennies

Claude Code's real power isn't the Anthropic model sitting behind it, it's the agentic loop: the file-system access, the tool use, the way it chains tasks together without you babysitting every step. I figured this out the expensive way. I ran…

A Beginner's Guide to Claude Computer Use

I've been letting Claude control my mouse and keyboard on and off to test this feature for a little while, and the honest answer is that it's simultaneously the most impressive and most frustrating AI feature I've used. It can navigate…

DGX Spark Alternatives: What to Buy Instead

In today's post we're taking a closer look at the DGX Spark alternatives, and why, with the Spark at $6,950 and out of stock, a desktop graphics card is still the better buy for most people, with a 128GB Strix Halo mini PC or a Mac Studio for the models that won't fit on one. Every price is as of 10 October, and I've put my own pair of modded 48GB 4090Ds up against the Spark.

How to make SVGs and images in Claude with Gemini MCP

Gemini MCP gives Claude Google's Nano Banana Pro image model, Veo video and SVG generation, with the results shown in the chat. In today's guide we're taking a closer look at where it came from, how to set it up in Claude Desktop and Claude Code, and what it made: a photoreal desk, a printed label that came back letter for letter, and the three showcase pieces from Paper's Quiver launch, traced to SVG from Nano Banana Pro images.

The Best MCPs for SEO and Content Marketing (Research, Publish, Measure)

I ran an SEO agency for sixteen years, so I know exactly where the billable hours go - and it's not the clever part. In today's post I'm sharing the content-marketing and SEO MCP stack I now run through Claude, organised by the phase of work where each one earns its keep, including seo-audit, the one I built to kill the grunt.

How to set up LM Studio: GPU offload, developer mode and your first local model

Turn a gaming GPU into a working local AI model with LM Studio - free, no billing, no API key. In today's guide, we install it, point it at the GPU, download a first model, and then go through the settings: GPU offload, context length, Flash Attention, temperature and top-k, and the Developer mode that unlocks them.

claude-code · local-llm

Cut your Claude Code bill with houtini-lm, and get a second opinion

We built houtini-lm so Claude Code can stay the orchestrator while other models do the work: a cheaper frontier model, a local model on your own GPU, or a specialist with a skill Claude doesn't have. In today's post we're taking a closer look at what my average Claude Code day costs, what the same work costs elsewhere, and what a second model on the job adds besides the saving.

claude-code · openrouter

How to Create LinkedIn Carousel Slides with Gemini and Claude

A developer workflow for turning blog posts into LinkedIn carousel slides using Gemini SVG generation, Puppeteer PDF conversion, and a four-line Python merge script. No Canva, no SaaS tools.

How to Run a Free AI Content Detector Locally

The #1-ranked AI detector is free, runs on your own PC, and never uploads your text - unlike Originality.ai or GPTZero. Here's how to run it, or the tool I built.

Claude for Excel: How to Add It, Use It and Check Its Work

I first tested Claude for Excel in its February beta, and this week I ran it again on 20,000 rows of product data made messy on purpose. This guide covers how to add it, the edit setting to check before you start, and why it does its best work one simple step at a time.

Working with AI: Using the Gmail MCP in Claude

I've got a client over in Australia who are *just* warming up after a lengthy Christmas break. It's an SAP B1 integration with Shopify and Onetimpim - many moving parts! My client emailed this morning asking for a catch-up meeting and…

RAG Without RAG: How to Make a Content Research Index for Claude

This weekend's project started with a simple need: collect the transcripts from around 20 YouTube videos from my client's Youtube channel, for a research corpus. The goal was to accurately use the Youtube data to reference in the content…

Desktop Commander MCP: Give Claude Full Control of Your Computer (2026)

Desktop Commander is the MCP that gives Claude full read-write access to your computer - files, terminal, code. The setup guide that's missing from the docs, plus the gotchas that catch people on day one.

Claude Desktop Tutorial: a Beginner's Guide

In today's guide, we're starting from scratch with Claude Desktop, the app where AI stops being a chatbot and starts doing jobs for you. We install it, change a few settings, connect Gmail for an email summary, then cover Projects, context and letting Claude work on files on your own disk without putting anything at risk.

claude-code · claude-desktop

How to connect Google Search Console to Claude with an MCP server

SEO Audit Console is a free MCP server that pulls your Search Console history into a database on your own machine, joins it to a crawl of your site, and lets Claude query both. In today's guide we're taking a closer look at how to set it up in Claude Desktop or Claude Code, run the first sync and crawl, and ask your first SEO questions.

claude-code · mcp

How to Set Up the DataForSEO MCP with Claude Desktop (2026)

In today's guide we're connecting the official DataForSEO MCP (v3) to Claude Desktop: there's a zero-install hosted option, a local setup if you'd rather hold the keys, and a new docs-plus-gateway model worth understanding before you start.

Chrome DevTools MCP: What It Does, and When to Use Something Else

Google's Chrome DevTools MCP gave coding agents a real Chrome to debug in. These days I use Claude's own browser for debugging and design, so here's what the MCP does now, how to install it, and where each of the alternatives fits.