Cory Bohon

One of my latest iPhone application lets you shrink your URLs to something a little more manageable. Aptly named, Shrinker for iPhone lets you type in a long URL, then with a tap shorten it using TinyURL.com (Bit.ly and other shortening services will be coming soon). You can copy the link to the iPhone clipboard or email the link right from within the application.

From the iTunes App Store:
Long URLs can confuse people. Whether you’re sending a link through email, instant messaging, text messaging, or simply copying it for later use, make Shrinker an application on your iPhone. Shrinker lets you take a long URL and shrink it down to something a little more manageable. Right from the application you can shorten your links, create an email to someone with the link pasted right in, or copy the link to the clipboard for later use.

Where to get it
Download Shrinker today for free from the iTunes App Store (the application is iAd supported) and never leave any of your email readers confused by long links.

I wanted to post a quick update about the Two Weeks, Two Open Source Projects post that I wrote earlier this week.

The first of the open source projects that I set out to create is for the most part done. I actually finished earlier than I thought I would, and it didn’t take as much programming time and effort as I first thought. I will be posting more about this project a little later, when I’m able to get the code completely finalized and uploaded to my server and create a wiki for the project.

Basically, Linkr allows you to shorten a URL (or create a redirect URL) right from your own server. So, you could point to a very long URL (for example the one to this post: http://corybohon.com/2010/05/two-weeks-two-open-source-projects/) from a much shorter URL that’s easy to share (for example: corybohon.com/linkr/?id=22). Obviously, if you had the software installed in the root directory, the URL would be much, much shorter.

Since Tuesday, I’ve been able to write over 530 lines of code that will do this task. The software is very basic at it’s core, written using PHP, MySQL, and HTML. There’s a back-end admin panel that will allow an administrator to configure URL redirects and manage users. The front-end is rather basic, allowing you to briefly see the name of the website you’re being redirected to before being whisked off to that site. You can see the front-end interface here: http://corybohon.com/linkr/.

There are still some bugs that I need to work out, but I will release the code for everyone to play around with this weekend. Be sure to check back. I should have the beta up at the very latest on Sunday night.

I don’t like sitting around, not doing anything. I tend to always have a full schedule during school semesters, but during the summer, my schedule is a bit more lax. Therefore, I came up with an interesting idea: Build two open source projects in just two weeks.

I doubt I’ll be able to get them completely finished, but I’m hoping to at least get a beta version of two pieces of web software I’ve been wanting to write.

First is a URL redirecting tool that anyone can install and use on their own domain. You’d be able to login and add a new redirect, then use that URL on Twitter, Facebook, or wherever.

Second will be a bit more challenging. I want to build a simple blogging platform that just gets back to basics. A blogging platform without any of the clutter of modern platforms.

I’ll be posting back my results, so check back often. And, yes, I know these tools already exist, but I AM trying to reinvent the wheel with these projects and (hopefully) let the creativity of others flow.

If you have any questions or would like to see more content like this, feel free to contact me.

Sure, you could use TinyURL or some other URL shortening (or redirect) service. But what happens if you want a self-hosted solution to the all so common long URL problem? Well, I haven’t seen a truly usable tool … until now! Sidepath is a URL shortening tool that you can install on your own web server.

Sidepath is also modest on the server requirements:

• Linux
• Apache
• MySQL
• PHP

You can download the software for free (although if you want support, you need to cough up the munies … c’mon, it’s only $10.75 US).