developer-oss-research

Developer & open-source research

Look up GitHub repos, users, and orgs, plus Chrome Web Store extensions, as normalized JSON from the Crawlora API — no scraping github.com or the Chrome Web Store.

When to use this skill

• "Tell me about this GitHub repo/user/org" (stars, languages, followers).
• "What's trending on GitHub right now?" (by language).
• "Who contributes to this repo?" / "what are its releases?"
• "Tell me about this Chrome extension" (permissions, privacy, reviews).
• "Search extensions for " or "what's similar to this extension?"

Setup (one-time)

• Get a free Crawlora API key (2,000 credits/mo, no card) at https://crawlora.net.
• export CRAWLORA_API_KEY=sk_your_key_here
• All requests: x-api-key: $CRAWLORA_API_KEY against https://api.crawlora.net/api/v1. Missing/invalid key → 401.

How it works

1. GitHub repos — /github/search/repositories (q, GitHub search syntax works) to find one; /github/repo/{owner}/{repo} for detail, plus /contributors, /languages, /releases, /forks.
2. GitHub users/orgs — /github/search/users (q); /github/user/{username} (+ /followers, /following, /repos, /events, /pinned) or /github/org/{org} (+ /repos). /github/trending and /github/trending/developers (filter by language, since) cover what's hot right now.
3. Chrome Web Store — /chromewebstore/search (term) to find an extension id; /chromewebstore/item for detail, /permissions, /privacy, /reviews, /similar. /chromewebstore/charts and /chromewebstore/category cover browsing/trending; /chromewebstore/developer lists everything one publisher ships.

Full endpoint list, methods, and params: reference/endpoints.md.

Calling the API

# GitHub:
scripts/crawlora.sh /github/search/repositories q="language:go stars:>1000" | jq '.'
scripts/crawlora.sh /github/repo/anthropics/claude-code | jq '.'
scripts/crawlora.sh /github/trending language=python | jq '.'

# Chrome Web Store:
scripts/crawlora.sh /chromewebstore/search term="ad blocker" | jq '.'
scripts/crawlora.sh /chromewebstore/item id= | jq '.'

Raw curl fallback:

curl -fsS -H "x-api-key: $CRAWLORA_API_KEY" \
  "https://api.crawlora.net/api/v1/github/user/torvalds" | jq '.'

Endpoint reference

See reference/endpoints.md for every GitHub and Chrome Web Store endpoint this skill uses.

Examples

• Repo due diligence: /github/repo/{owner}/{repo} + /contributors + /releases to gauge activity and maintenance health before depending on it.
• Trending scan: /github/trending (by language) + /github/trending/developers for a daily/weekly pulse on what's gaining traction.
• Extension safety check: /chromewebstore/item + /permissions + /privacy before recommending or installing a browser extension.

Notes & limits

• Credits / pay-on-success: billed only on 2xx; free tier 2,000 credits/mo. Key at https://crawlora.net.
• Public data only — public profile/repo/extension pages.
• Security: key lives in CRAWLORA_API_KEY only — never hardcode, query-param, or commit it.
• GitHub search accepts GitHub's own search qualifiers (language:, stars:>N, org:, …) inside q — same syntax as github.com's search bar.
• List endpoints are paginated (page/per_page) — walk pages for full coverage.