LightURL

[Mcmar]

http://l-url.com/


A new cool script that soon will be for sale. It's all coded by my mate out of some of my ideas.

The script it self are really light, and it create light URL's aswell.

It only uses 2 tables in database, one for hit count and one for url. Which make it light.

(Still under development)

Please report if you notice any bugs. Thanks.

 

[kyle789]

Looks good but I don't like the question mark(?) in the URL.

 

[Mcmar]

Looks good but I don't like the question mark(?) in the URL.

It's because its using Minimal of webspace, bandwidth.. Unlike other URL Shorteners. It's shorting the URL A way difrent way than the ones that are on market now.

And if the script are going to be light as it is.. It nearly HAS To have it.

 

[Danny.Domb]

Looks good but I don't like the question mark(?) in the URL.

It's because its using Minimal of webspace, bandwidth.. Unlike other URL Shorteners. It's shorting the URL A way difrent way than the ones that are on market now.

And if the script are going to be light as it is.. It nearly HAS To have it.

Seems to be a nice script... keep up the good work

 

[oOo--STAR--oOo]

Hey,

I am the creator of the script and I can clarify a few factors on it.
The reason we have the ? in the url is to make it compatible with *most* web servers.
I myself use Nginx as its a lot faster and can handle more connections more easily than Apache, also a lot better on resources.
Although it not as glorious in functions and plugins, its certainly worth the hassle to transform to Nginx for the speed benefits.


The main principle of having a short URL is to make it short.. So the fact of the ? doesn't really matter, as we are just shortening the URL.
Compatibility and usability is key I think.

There is still a lot more features to put in that I have ideas for.

How it works right now.
Basically you can enter a link, it check to see if it is a valid link then create a Light URL if the link is valid.
You can keep track of all the links you have personally entered with hit stats, that are specific to your Light URL only.
So you and other people can both create a Light URL for say facebook.com and both have your own light url and hit stats.
You can not enter the same URL in twice, on an individual user basis.

It will also shrink a lot of the original URL as well. I will show you an example.
If you do a search in google then on any of the results, right click and copy the link.
Enter that link into the Light url and it will transform that link into the actual site you was visiting.
Another example is try this link, see what the original URL turns out to be.
http://validator.w3.org/check?uri=h...(detect+automatically)&doctype=Inline&group=0

I am also going to be creating an API that can be used with this software so that you can either combine the 2 pieces or use someone else's to automatically create Light URL's automatically.

All feedback is welcome.
If your feedback is negative please include reason why and what can be done to make it positive.

Thanks for reading,
Star.

 

[kyle789]

I accept what you're saying about the ? but you can surely see it doesn't look right? I mean, a URL shortener should have only letters and numbers and absolutely no extra characters.

Less is more with these things

 

[Lautaro]

You should check your url validation.

 

[Mcmar]

You should check your url validation.

Hmm, have you checked the huge sites if their validation works? Like, tinyurl etc. The only site that have a working URL Validation is bitly. Not seen any other scripts that has 100% Working URL Validation

 

[oOo--STAR--oOo]

You should check your url validation.

Hmm, have you checked the huge sites if their validation works? Like, tinyurl etc. The only site that have a working URL Validation is bitly. Not seen any other scripts that has 100% Working URL Validation

Even bitly cannot 100% verify a link.
http://bit.ly/sv65Ez

Reason: No matter what, you will get random responses from all links.
I tried to verify the link using all the methods I know.
Curl, ajax call backs, and 3 + methods in PHP.
All of them produce random results.
So the actual confirmation of the links does work but is not 100% accurate.
So it will reduce spam.

I accept what you're saying about the ? but you can surely see it doesn't look right? I mean, a URL shortener should have only letters and numbers and absolutely no extra characters.
Less is more with these things

As stated the whole purpose for light URL is to make the URL light.. Its not like you are going to remember the digits.
With this requires no rewrite rules, simple URL transformation. Keeping the script light and fast!
As long as the URL is short. Its doing its job.
Thanks for the concern.

 

[Danny.Domb]

Reason: No matter what, you will get random responses from all links.
I tried to verify the link using all the methods I know.
Curl, ajax call backs, and 3 + methods in PHP.
All of them produce random results.
So the actual confirmation of the links does work but is not 100% accurate.
So it will reduce spam.

Hmm... did you ever try to check the http answer with an ajax call?
I mean... if you get a 200, then it's fine, otherwise you simply show an error message...
Pretty easy to do no?

 

[oOo--STAR--oOo]

Reason: No matter what, you will get random responses from all links.
I tried to verify the link using all the methods I know.
Curl, ajax call backs, and 3 + methods in PHP.
All of them produce random results.
So the actual confirmation of the links does work but is not 100% accurate.
So it will reduce spam.

Hmm... did you ever try to check the http answer with an ajax call?
I mean... if you get a 200, then it's fine, otherwise you simply show an error message...
Pretty easy to do no?

Yep.. I tried this.

example.

$.ajax({
    type: "GET",
    url: url,
    success: function(html){
    // callback here
    },
    error: function(){
    //callback here
    }
});

Even tried things like getting the header information for 404 or 200.
Its just random.

 

[oOo--STAR--oOo]

Also I would just like to add.
If the ? means so much to anyone.. It would be very simple to do only chars in the link.
But will only be compatible with Apache and Nginx once the rules and instructions are set for how to set up the server config for Nginx.

I will think about including this after I have finished the rest of the ideas I have set out for it.

 

[Piers]

Hi there mate, it's Piers from MSN. I would keep the ? - I don't really see an issue with having it and keeping the compatibility in there.

The purpose of the script it to produce a shorter URL for users - it does that.

 

[Rodolfo]

People don't want "?" in the URL, simple as that.

 

[Danny.Domb]

The purpose of the script it to produce a shorter URL for users - it does that.

Yes... but listening to the clients is far more important, if your first clients doesn't get what they want with the script, they won't recommend it to others, then you will lose more clients... for a simple ?

 

[oOo--STAR--oOo]

The purpose of the script it to produce a shorter URL for users - it does that.

Yes... but listening to the clients is far more important, if your first clients doesn't get what they want with the script, they won't recommend it to others, then you will lose more clients... for a simple ?

I agree that the client is always right.
So for this reason, I will configure an install where they can choose based on their web server the setup they would like.
It might be best to create 2 different versions based on the users server.
So that they will get one that will work for them.
To still keep the scripts light and eliminate any extra checking.
I will consider my options.

Thanks for the feedback!