URL Shortener

This project is a full-stack application, created as a solution for a test assignment. It is built with NestJS, NextJS/React, and PostgreSQL.

It allows users to create shortened versions of links to make them easier to share and remember. For example, a long URL like https://some.place.example.com/foo/bar/biz can be shortened to https://short.ly/abc123.

Running the project

Docker mode

This stack can be run using Docker Compose:

docker compose up -d

This will spin up all required containers, including the API and the frontend. You can access the frontend at http://localhost:3001.

Development mode

Prerequisites

By default, backend expects PostgreSQL serving by the following URL: postgresql://deep:deep@localhost:5432/deep. This can be changed in the /.env file.

As an option, PostgresSQL can be spin up using Docker:

docker run --name postgres-dev -e POSTGRES_PASSWORD=deep -e POSTGRES_USER=deep -e POSTGRES_DB=deep -p 5432:5432 -d postgres

Backend

npm install

# This will create the database schema and seed the database with some data
npm run migrate:deploy && npm run seed

npm run start:dev

This will start the API on http://localhost:3000

Frontend

cd ui
npm install
npm run dev

This will start the frontend on http://localhost:3001

Technical requirements

Must have

✅ Build a web page with a form for entering a URL

✅ When the form is submitted, return a shortened version of the URL

✅ Save a record of the shortened URL to a database

✅ Ensure the slug of the URL (abc123 in the screenshot above) is unique

✅ When the shortened URL is accessed, redirect to the stored URL

ℹ️ (1) If an invalid slug is accessed, display a 404 Not Found page

Required Tech

✅ React w/ typescript for the front end

✅ Node.JS w/ typescript for the backend

✅ Docker

Extra Credit

ℹ️ (2) Add support for accounts so people can view the URLs they created

✅ Validate the URL provided is an actual URL

✅ Make it easy to copy the shortened URL to the clipboard

✅ Allow users to modify the slug of their URL

✅ Track visits to the shortened URL

✅ Add rate-limiting to prevent bad-actors from spamming the service

✅ Update API to follow a known spec (such as json:api)

Notes

ℹ️ (1) Despite trying different approaches, my lack of experience with NextJS and the time constraints led me to deprioritize this feature.

ℹ️ (2) User accounts and URL-to-user relationships are implemented on the backend side, but the frontend currently uses a hardcoded mock user.

I'm open to discussing the implementation of these features and any other improvements.

Run tests

I have added basic end-to-end tests in test/url.e2e-spec.ts. Unit tests are provided as they came with the example project.

# unit tests
npm run test

# e2e tests
$ npm run test:e2e

Documentation

Once the project is running, you can access the Swagger documentation on http://localhost:3000/api