Not working/reacting.

[NitroNils]

This has been a great tool I used to use whenever a too long URL entered my life.
I hate "free" services which are just datatraps.
Anyway, my SD card failed and I lived w/out it until suddenly I needed to fit something into a tweet so I reinstalled it.

Problem is that it just hanged when pressing shorten! So I tried several things like selecting 'Strong' first and turning off data.
With data turned off it didn't hang anymore, just didn't react to shorten commands!

I thought it would work offline, but then I found this page saying the site is down due to lack of funding. So sad. I'd be glad to support you a little if I had the dough for it - after all I love this service.

Is there a way this could run again, or should it work even without the site?

Or if not - Is there a way to shorten URLs without using the evil services out there?

Thank you.

Huawei P8 Lite (ALE-21)
Android 6.0
Latest HDAurl from F-Droid

[cryptofuture]

Glad to hear there was an android app user. And I'm very sorry it goes that way at this moment.
I didn't expected it goes this way too, and was able to only backup some data, but had no time to move a service. Android app source code is available, basically you need to only change host url for url you do post request to.
Overall if you want to run it yourself the minimal cost would be around $4-5 per month for an vps (with nginx and postgres), domain price and you need to change two strings in the android app.

But there are few hidden cost, like you need a privacy policy, and you actually might need to use another vps as front, since sometimes url shortening services are used to create phishing links, and in that case most time abuse could go directly to the your vps provider, and some of them instead of doing research and giving you time to remove that link from db would just lock your account, so you need to do provider selection carefully. Also you might need to have a spare vps for postgres backups, or you could just sync backups time after time locally or both.

So overall in my case I used OVH vps host -> front vps without actual db (on vultr, and don't recommend them) and cloudflare CDN with authenticated origin pulls. So, in the bad situation abuse hits cloudflare first and secondly another provider without actual data.

But in my case the real problem was is that I was holding set of vpses from the work (while had a compensation for those in crypto), and also another two for my personal projects.
So, considering that I was compensated for work contributions around a year in crypto (I left that project), was holding only crypto and had lent some money from a friend that I invested in crypto. So, basically all my savings + investments (that were x5-x7 times bigger than a sum I lend from a friend) are nearly enough to even payback a friend at this point. And while I have a relatively small overdue around $100 on OVH, selling any crypto to fiat at this point and paying fiat every month would cost like x3-4 times more, since some of holdings I have now, I bought for a fiat price that was x3-x5 than you could now. So, I had no choice, but to close a service, until I will be able to payback a friend, and (ideally) find more stable passive income source.

Btw, problem with vultr is that if you have an overdue, even if you stop an vps, they would be fully charging you! And if you have an overdue, you can't delete that service from an account ether, until you cover overdue. So, I like blindingly waited one month with a service down, while they charged fully for the next month, and also they have freq network speed degradation (like notices 4 times every month).

[NitroNils]

Sorry to hear that, I hope it worked out.
I miss a trustworthy shortener like your excellent service.
If I owned money I could take your advice. Thank you for clear explanation!
Maybe I could run a personal one if I ever get to do server stuff?
Or I haven't a clear understanding of the concept of how it operates.
Anyway, hope life is good :)

[cryptofuture]

You could setup locally (on .local domain for example), and move it online, as long as you would be sure it works fine. Also you could use services like afraid at first if you want to avoid domain cost or run it locally with dynamic ip. I'd say setup is rather easy, especially if you would be using nginx-hda-bundle
https://github.com/cryptofuture/nginx-hda-bundle

[NitroNils]

I recently discovered Afraid, thanks again. For the bundle!

[NitroNils]

Sorry for cryptoposting, but for some reason this issue was on top of my list in the OctoDroid Android GitHub viewer :)