URL Shortener & Tracker

	A lightweight URL shortening service with built‑in analytics. Create short links, track clicks in real time, and understand your traffic without external tools.

Preview

Features

• 🔗 Shorten long URLs into clean, shareable links
• 📊 Click tracking (total, unique, timestamp, referrer)
• 🌍 Geo & device analytics (optional)
• ⏱ Real‑time statistics dashboard
• 🔐 Optional authentication & private links
• 🧩 RESTful API

Use Cases

• Marketing campaign tracking
• Sharing clean links on social media
• Measuring link performance
• Internal tooling / personal analytics

Tech Stack (example)

• Backend: FastAPI
• Database: PostgreSQL
• Frontend (optional): Vue.js
• Analytics: IP + User‑Agent parsing
• Auth (admin): TOKEN

How It Works

1. User submits a long URL
2. App generates a unique short code
3. Short URL redirects to the original URL
4. Each redirect logs analytics data

API Overview

Create Short URL

POST /api/shorten

Request

{
  "url": "https://example.com/very/long/url"
}

Response

{
  "r": "https://your.app/aZ3kQ"
}

Redirect & Track

GET /:code

• Redirects to original URL
• Logs click metadata automatically

Get Stats

GET /api/stats/:code

Returns click count, timestamps, referrers, devices, etc.

Tracking Data

• Total clicks
• Unique visitors
• Date & time
• Referrer
• Device / OS / Browser
• Country / city (if enabled)

Privacy Notes

• IPs can be anonymized
• No cookies required
• GDPR‑friendly setup possible

Setup (Local)

git clone https://github.com/yourname/url-shortener
cd url-shortener
npm install
npm run dev

Environment variables:

• DATABASE_URL
• BASE_URL
• JWT_SECRET (optional)

Roadmap

• Custom aliases
• Expiration dates
• QR code generation
• Webhooks
• Rate limiting

License

GNU Affero General Public License v3.0

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Feel free to adapt this README to your stack or deployment style.