Rust-URL-Shortening

Rust URL Shortener Service

A full‑stack URL shortening service built entirely in Rust using Actix‑web and Diesel with SQLite. This service allows users to:

Create Short URLs: Submit a long URL and receive a unique, shortened URL.
List URLs: Retrieve a list of all shortened URLs.
Redirection: Visit a short URL to be automatically redirected to the original URL.

Why Use Rust?

Performance: Rust is known for its high performance and low overhead, making it ideal for building fast, scalable web services.
Memory Safety: Rust’s ownership system guarantees memory safety without needing a garbage collector, which minimizes runtime errors.
Concurrency: Rust provides powerful concurrency primitives that help in building robust, multi-threaded applications.
Modern Tooling: With a growing ecosystem, Rust offers excellent tooling (cargo, rustfmt, clippy) for building and maintaining reliable software.
Reliability: Rust’s strict compile-time checks catch many bugs early in development, ensuring a more reliable codebase.

Technology Stack

Web Framework: Actix‑web
ORM & Database: Diesel with SQLite
Environment Management: dotenvy for environment variables
Utilities: rand for generating short codes, chrono for timestamps

File Structure

rust-url-shortener/
├── Cargo.toml
├── .env
├── migrations/
│   └── 20230310123456_create_urls/
│       ├── up.sql
│       └── down.sql
├── src/
│   ├── main.rs
│   ├── db.rs
│   ├── models.rs
│   ├── schema.rs
│   └── routes.rs
└── README.md

Getting Started

Prerequisites

Rust & Cargo: Install via rustup.rs
SQLite: Ensure SQLite is installed on your system.

Diesel CLI: Install Diesel CLI with SQLite support by running:

cargo install diesel_cli --no-default-features --features sqlite

Setup

Clone the Repository or Create the Project Folder

You can create the file structure using the following terminal commands:

# Create project directory and initialize a new binary project
mkdir rust-url-shortener
cd rust-url-shortener
cargo init --bin

# Create directories for Diesel migrations
mkdir -p migrations/20230310123456_create_urls

# Create migration SQL files
touch migrations/20230310123456_create_urls/up.sql
touch migrations/20230310123456_create_urls/down.sql

# Create additional source files
cd src
touch db.rs models.rs schema.rs routes.rs
cd ..

Create a .env File

In the project root, create a file named .env with the following content (adjust values as needed):
```
DATABASE_URL=rust_url_shortener.db
BASE_URL=http://localhost:8080
```
Run Diesel Migrations

Set up the database schema by running:
```
diesel migration run
```

Running the Application

Build and Run the Server
```
cargo run
```
The server will start at http://localhost:8080.
API Endpoints

Create URL:
POST / with JSON body:
```
{
  "original_url": "https://example.com"
}
```
Returns the created URL entry with a generated short code.
List URLs:
GET / returns a list of shortened URLs.
Redirection:
GET /{short_code} redirects to the original URL if found.

Customization

Changing the BASE_URL:
Update the BASE_URL variable in your .env file to reflect your domain (e.g., https://yourdomain.com).
Extending Functionality:
Modify or add additional endpoints in src/routes.rs and update models in src/models.rs as needed.
Integrating a Frontend:
This example provides a robust backend API. You can build a frontend in your preferred technology to consume this API.

Contributing

Feel free to fork this repository and submit pull requests with improvements or customizations. For issues or feature requests, please open an issue.

License

This project is licensed under the MIT License.

Authors

The UNC-CH Google Developer Student Club (GDSC) team.

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