Saturday, October 26, 2024

Introducing Lua.sh - Our Open Source URL Shortener

Paulo Castellano
Paulo Castellano
Open Source
Product
Introducing Lua.sh - Our Open Source URL Shortener

We're excited to announce the launch of Lua.sh, a modern, open-source URL shortener built with performance and simplicity in mind. Whether you're looking to shorten links for social media, track click analytics, or integrate URL shortening into your own applications, Lua.sh provides a robust solution that's both powerful and easy to use.

What is Lua.sh?

Lua.sh is a free and open-source URL shortening service that allows you to transform long, unwieldy URLs into concise, shareable links. Our platform is designed to be:

  • Open and Transparent: Full source code available on GitHub
  • Free to Use: Cloud-hosted version with a generous free plan
  • Self-hostable: Deploy and run your own instance with full control
  • Developer-friendly: Built with modern technologies for reliability and extensibility

Technical Stack

We've built Lua.sh using a powerful and modern technology stack:

Backend

  • Laravel: A robust PHP framework providing a solid foundation for our application
  • MySQL: Reliable and performant database management for link storage and analytics

Frontend

  • Vue 3: The progressive JavaScript framework for building our dynamic user interface
  • InertiaJS: Seamlessly connecting our Laravel backend with Vue.js frontend

This combination of technologies allows us to deliver a fast, responsive, and scalable URL shortening service while maintaining clean, maintainable code.

Key Features

  • Quick Link Shortening: Generate short URLs with just a few clicks
  • Custom Links: Create memorable, branded short URLs
  • Analytics Dashboard: Track link performance and engagement
  • API Access: Integrate URL shortening into your own applications
  • Custom Domains: Use your own domain for short links
  • Team Collaboration: Share links and analytics with your team

Getting Started

You can start using Lua.sh today in two ways:

  1. Cloud Service: Visit lua.sh to create an account and start shortening URLs immediately
  2. Self-hosted: Clone our GitHub repository and follow the installation instructions to run your own instance

Open Source Community

We believe in the power of open source software and community collaboration. By making Lua.sh open source, we're inviting developers to:

  • Contribute to the project
  • Report issues and suggest improvements
  • Create custom modifications for specific needs
  • Learn from and build upon our codebase

What's Next?

This is just the beginning for Lua.sh. We're actively working on new features and improvements, including:

  • User Role Access Control
  • Webhooks
  • API improvements and additional SDKs
  • Audit Logs

Join Us

We're excited to see how you'll use Lua.sh in your projects. Visit our website to get started, or check out our GitHub repository to explore the code and contribute to the project.

Let's make URL shortening better, together!

Have questions or feedback? Join our community on GitHub!

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