Flexport Version-Tolerant Upgrade

Overview

Flexport supports account-default version selection plus per-request Flexport-Version overrides. Backward-compatible additions can include attributes, resources, optional parameters, enum values, and event types, so readers and routers must be additive-tolerant.

Prerequisites

• Current account default and every application override
• Endpoint/event inventory with sanitized fixtures
• Target-version diff, owner approvals, canary, and rollback

Instructions

Step 1: Discover effective versions

Record the account default and explicit header behavior for every client; do not assume a hardcoded v2 path determines the contract.

Step 2: Classify changes

Separate breaking target-version differences from compatible additions that may appear without an account-version switch.

Step 3: Harden readers

Ignore or preserve unknown optional fields, route unknown enum/event values safely, and fail only when a required invariant is absent.

Step 4: Test with overrides

Exercise approved read-only calls using the target Flexport-Version header while production remains on its current default.

Step 5: Canary one cohort

Deploy tolerant code first, switch a bounded read cohort, compare business outcomes, then enable mutations only after reconciliation passes.

Step 6: Change default last

Coordinate account-default changes after all clients are ready, retain explicit rollback overrides, and verify events plus in-flight operations.

Authentication

REST calls authenticate with a cached OAuth 2.0 client-credentials Bearer token using audience https://api.flexport.com, or an explicitly accepted broad API key. Use distinct credentials per workload and never log credentials or tokens. MCP calls use the authenticated connection to https://mcp.flexport.com/mcp and remain subject to each tool's documented account permissions.

Tool Discipline

Use Read and Grep for discovery and evidence. Use Write or Edit only for the approved artifact, code, configuration, test, or receipt described by this workflow; do not make an unapproved Flexport-side change.

Output

• Scoped decision or implementation artifact
• Redacted operation and validation receipt
• Failure, rollback, and follow-up ownership record

Return a machine-reviewable receipt in this shape; adapt the operation values, but never place credentials or provider payloads in it:

surface: rest-v3
operation: shipment-read
decision: approved
outcome: verified
evidence:
  release_sha: recorded-out-of-band
  provider_reference: redacted
rollback_owner: logistics-platform

Examples

A parser learns to preserve unknown shipment attributes and quarantine unknown event types. The team tests reads with Flexport-Version: 3, canaries them, then changes the account default only after every client passes.

Error Handling

Failure	Response
Effective version unknown	Stop and inspect account settings plus outbound headers.
Unknown additive enum crashes routing	Quarantine safely and make parsing tolerant.
Read results diverge	Pause migration and reconcile semantic, expansion, and pagination differences.
Rollback header untested	Do not change the account default.

Resources

• First-party source notes
• Versioning
• Flexport v3 API reference
• Milestones