README.md

URL Shortener app with PHP + MySQL / MariaDB

A mini/micro project meant for URL shortening using PHP & MySQL as DBMS.

Setting up project locally / production

Clone the repository;

NOTE: Make sure to navigate to your web-server directory (for example /var/www/html for Ubuntu OS)

git clone https://github.com/ch3nkula/url-shortener.git

Install dependencies for the project;

composer update

NOTE: You must have composer installed for this to work. To install composer, check the official website.

Setup database & it's credentials;

1. Import the urls.sql database schema to your database (with name url_shortener). You can import using phpMyAdmin or Command-Line for MySQL. Once you import this schema, move straight to setting up credentials.

2. Duplicate the file called .env.example and rename the duplicate copy to .env

cp .env.example .env

3. In the .env file, there are two sections, one for local config and the other for production configs. Fill the section for local configs for example;

LOCAL_DB_HOST=<host-name>
LOCAL_DB_USER=<database-user>
LOCAL_DB_PASSWORD=<database-password>
LOCAL_DB_NAME=<database-name>

Run / Test the application locally

Once you are done with the steps above, try to run and test the application using PHP's in-built server.

1. Run the application by typing and executing the command below;

php -S localhost:3000

NOTE: It's important to use port 3000 as it's used in the application.

2. Move over to your favorite browser, mine is Google Chrome or Safari and test the application by typing in the address bar; https://localhost:3000.

If things work as expected, then you should see this on your browser

Final Step

If you see the above image, then you are almost there, try pasting a long URL in the form field and see if the app generates a short URL (see image below). If you get a short URL, then it work well. Enjoy!

License

MIT License