Short link is a Padrino application that sits on a top-level domain and does what I'm calling "smart referrals". Basically, when any request comes in, short-link goes through the following steps:

1. Is this an admin request?
2. Is this a request I know about in my database?
3. Forward the request to another domain.

I created this application because I wanted more nuanced control over the way a mobile friendly domain referred to my longer domain (in my case, from http://atp1.us to http://andrew.pilsch.com). Basically, this site lets you create custom referrals, such that http://shortdomain.com/X can forward to wherever you want.

After cloning, run the following commands:

(Note, if you're using Ruby 1.8.X, change the line gem 'redcarpet' to gem 'redcarpet', '2.3.0').

bundle install

padrino rake db:migrate

padrino rake db:seed

After these commands, you need to edit the file app/app.rb and change the line @@default_url = "http://andrew.pilsch.com" to whatever your default, long URL will be. After that, you should be ready to go.

To start the application, you can run:

padrino start

For more information on deploying this software, see Padrino's documentation for how to deploy your application.

The application is driven through the /admin interface. When running in development mode (padrino start), you can point your browser to http://localhost:3000/admin and log in with the credentials you created when running rake db:seed. You can click the "Links" link and then click the "New" tab to begin creating your referrals.