How to Install Simply Shorten on Arch Linux

Simply Shorten is a URL shortening service that helps to shorten lengthy URLs. It is an open-source project built using Ruby on Rails, and it is available on GitLab. In this tutorial, we will show you how to install Simply Shorten on an Arch Linux system.

Prerequisites

Before we proceed with the installation, you need to ensure that you have the following:

  • An Arch Linux system with root privileges
  • Ruby
  • RubyGems
  • Git

Step 1: Clone Simply Shorten from GitLab

The first step is to clone the Git repository for Simply Shorten. Open a terminal window and enter the following command:

git clone https://gitlab.com/draganczukp/simply-shorten.git

This will download the source code for Simply Shorten to your local machine.

Step 2: Install Dependencies

Next, we need to install the project dependencies. Navigate to the Simply Shorten directory that you cloned in the previous step, and run the following command:

bundle install

This will install all the necessary RubyGems packages required for Simply Shorten to run correctly.

Step 3: Configure the Database

Simply Shorten requires a database to store URL data. By default, Simply Shorten uses SQLite as its database management system. You can change the default database settings in the config/database.yml file.

To create and migrate the database, run the following commands from the project directory:

rake db:create 
rake db:migrate

Step 4: Start the Server

Finally, we can start the Simply Shorten server. Enter the following command:

rails server

This will start the server, and you should see output similar to the following:

=> Booting WEBrick
=> Rails 6.0.3.4 application starting in development 
=> Run `rails server --help` for more startup options
=> Ctrl-C to shutdown server
[2020-11-19 20:39:31] INFO  WEBrick 1.4.2 
[2020-11-19 20:39:31] INFO  ruby 2.7.2 (2020-10-01) [x86_64-linux]
[2020-11-19 20:39:31] INFO  WEBrick::HTTPServer#start: pid=19743 port=3000

Now Simply Shorten is up and running. Open a web browser and visit http://localhost:3000 to see the home page.

Conclusion

In this tutorial, we have shown you how to install Simply Shorten on Arch Linux. You should now have a fully functional URL shortening service running on your system. You can customize the application further by changing its settings, features, and design.