How to Install Simple-URL-Shortener on Debian Latest

Simple-URL-Shortener is an open-source, self-hosted URL shortener written in PHP. It can help you shorten long URLs and make them easy to share. In this tutorial, we will show you how to install Simple-URL-Shortener on Debian Latest.

Prerequisites

Before you start, you need to have the following:

Step 1: Update the System

First, log in to the Debian server and update the system to the latest version:

sudo apt update
sudo apt upgrade

Step 2: Install Required Packages

Simple-URL-Shortener requires some packages to be installed before it can be installed. You can install the required packages with the following command:

sudo apt install apache2 php php-curl php-mbstring php-intl php-mysql mariadb-server

Step 3: Create a Database

You need to create a database for Simple-URL-Shortener. You can do this by running the following commands:

sudo mysql -u root

After logging in to MySQL, create a database named "simple-url-shortener":

CREATE DATABASE simple-url-shortener;

Then, create a user named "shortener" with a password:

CREATE USER 'shortener'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY 'YOUR_PASSWORD';

Grant privileges to the user on the database:

GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES ON simple-url-shortener.* TO 'shortener'@'localhost';

Finally, exit the MySQL interface:

exit

Step 4: Install Simple-URL-Shortener

Download the latest version of Simple-URL-Shortener from GitHub:

wget https://github.com/azlux/Simple-URL-Shortener/archive/master.zip

Extract the downloaded archive to the /var/www directory:

sudo unzip master.zip -d /var/www/
sudo mv /var/www/Simple-URL-Shortener-master /var/www/simple-url-shortener

Change the ownership of the /var/www/simple-url-shortener directory to the Apache user and group:

sudo chown -R www-data:www-data /var/www/simple-url-shortener

Create a virtual host for Simple-URL-Shortener:

sudo nano /etc/apache2/sites-available/simple-url-shortener.conf

Add the following lines to the configuration file:

<VirtualHost *:80>
    ServerName YOUR_DOMAIN_NAME
    DocumentRoot /var/www/simple-url-shortener

    <Directory /var/www/simple-url-shortener>
        Options FollowSymLinks
        AllowOverride All
        Require all granted
    </Directory>

    ErrorLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/error.log
    CustomLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/access.log combined
</VirtualHost>

Replace YOUR_DOMAIN_NAME with the actual domain name of your website.

Enable the virtual host:

sudo a2ensite simple-url-shortener.conf

Restart the Apache service:

sudo systemctl restart apache2

Step 5: Configure Simple-URL-Shortener

Create a copy of the config.sample.php file and rename it to config.php:

cd /var/www/simple-url-shortener/
cp config.sample.php config.php

Open the config.php file and update the database credentials:

nano config.php

Change the following lines:

define('DB_HOST', 'localhost');
define('DB_NAME', 'simple-url-shortener');
define('DB_USER', 'shortener');
define('DB_PASSWORD', 'ENTER_YOUR_PASSWORD_HERE');

Replace ENTER_YOUR_PASSWORD_HERE with the actual password you set for the "shortener" user.

Save and close the file.

Step 6: Test Simple-URL-Shortener

You can now test Simple-URL-Shortener by visiting your domain name in your web browser.

http://YOUR_DOMAIN_NAME/

You should see the installation screen.

Follow the on-screen instructions to finish the installation.

Conclusion

In this tutorial, you learned how to install Simple-URL-Shortener on Debian Latest. You can now use Simple-URL-Shortener to shorten long URLs and share them easily. Enjoy!

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