golink-gh-pages

A simple static url shortner hosted on github pages. All the data is stored in the github repo. Private github repo is supported. External users without github repo access won't see the data.

Live demo

• Accessable all around the world
  • http://go-l.ink/golink-intro
  • http://go-l.ink/google
  • http://go-l.ink/youtube/NasyGUeNMTs
• If you have dns installed.
  • go/golink-intro
  • go/google
  • go/youtube/NasyGUeNMTs

The repo of package is located at http://go-l.ink/golink

The repo of live demo is located at http://go-l.ink/golink-demo

Why github pages

Github pages ~~is free~~ provides the easiest way to maintain a service with no cost (time or money).

This project is inspired by golinks.io. You can try it if a private Github Pages repo is not a requirement for you.

Quick Start

You need nodejs installed to start. It will bring you node, npm and npx commands.

1. Create a new go.yourdomain.com repo in github with {gitignore: Node}

2. Clone the repo, init with golink-gh-pages, and push back to github.

      git clone git://github.com/yourorg/go.yourdomain.com
      cd go.yourdomain.com
      # npx will automatically download the golink init script in tmp folder.
      npx golink-gh-pages
      git add --all && commit -m "Init golink"
      git push origin master

3. Enable Github Pages on master/docs with your go.yourdomain.com domain.

4. (Optional) Setup Circle CI workflow.

5. (Optional) Setup "go" TLD to enable go/link in the browser.

Developing

Simply npx serve docs will simulate a github pages server on localhost 5000 port. npm run start script will rebuild static entries first before serving the sites. After server is started, open browser and navigate to localhost:5000/google. You'll be able to see the broswer is refreshing to google homepage.

Usage

Add your entry in entries.json

{
  "new-link": "https://github.com/poigolink/golink.poi.dev/edit/master/entries.json",
  "G": "https://www.google.com/",
  "YT": "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v="
}

Note the tailing slash "/" is important. It allows go/g/search?q=123 to be translated to https://www.google.com/search?q=123. Without tailing slash, it will become https://www.google.comsearch?q=123. You'll have to type go/g//search?q=123.

Then rebuild the project. New static entries will be created in the docs folder.

npm build
npm start

Verify localhost:5000/yt/NasyGUeNMTs

In general, if more data is included in the query string. The golink will strip the key and append the remain query to the targeted location. (e.g. localhost:5000/google/search?q=poifuture will be translated to www.google.com/search?q=poifuture )

Productionlize

To make the golink useful in the real world, the following steps are recommended.

Enable Github Pages

Of course!

Open github.com -> your repo -> Settings -> GitHub Pages -> Source: master/docs

Private repo is okay.

Set up custom domain

The good choice is https://go.corp.example.com. https setup would be good for security reason. You can follow the official GitHub Pages wiki to set up your custom domain.

Set up short url

Usually, your dns provider allows you to set 301 redirect (a.k.a forwarding) for your apex domain. (also known as root zone, host "@", etc.). In our live demo, the forwarding is set from "http://go-l.ink/" to "https://golink.poi.dev" (hosted in our demo repo ). So that you can access your golink globalwide. Try go-l.ink/google

Set up continuous delivery

Security alert! If you use default setup, everyone would be able to push any commits as your identity to GitHub

Continuous delivery is used to build the entry when anyone is modifing entries.json. By default, a Circle CI config is already provided in the repo. All you need to do is enabling your repo in Circle CI and grant write/push permission.

Again, the user key is dangerous. Check Circle CI docs for read/write repo key (deploy key) setup.

Grant Circle CI a user key at Circle CI -> Settings -> Permissons -> SSH Keys

Set up "go" TLD

This convinient setup will unlock your productivity significantly. You'll be able to access the doc you remember in your brain by simply typing go/an-awesome-doc in the browser. See a great document by golinks.io. To achieve this, there are 3 options.

Option 1: Run a redirection server on everyone's port 80

To set up, simply run

npx golink-gh-pages install-local-dns https://go.yourdomain.com

If the setup is successful, open http://go/google will redirect to google. Next time, simply type go/ to your document without searching everywhere.

The installation will create "~/golink-local.js", a 3-line pure nodejs redirect server. Then add a startup registry to run this server at port 80. Finally, the installation will write a "go" TLD entry to 127.0.0.1, which allows the browser to redirect the "go" domain same as "localhost"

Option 2: Run a org wide redirection server at a static ip port 80

Since port 80 is required. It would bring extra maintainance effort for this server. AWS Elastic IP + AWS Lambda is probably a good setup.

Option 3: Run a org wide dns server

Not all dns server supports this setup

Simply add a CNAME from "go" TLD to yourorg.github.io Growing teams will gain other benefits from a private dns at the same time.

Configs

Config file is located at golink.config.json. The following options are used to configure the build process.

cleanStart (default false): Clear the entries that doesn't exist in entries.json.

fuzzy (default true): Allow fuzzy match. Matches are case insensitive and all symbols will be ignored. (e.g. go/MyGReatBLOg5 can hit the my-great-blog-5 entry)

jekyll301 (default false): Generate jekyll front matters to do 301 redirection. This will improve the redirection performance in github pages. But it doesn't pass the query string to the targeted site.

sort (default true): Sort the entries every rebuild.

homepage: The jump link when no path is provided.

Alternatives

golinks.io is a reliable SaaS platform to provide the golinks to advanced users.

Credits

Huge appreciation to Google internal golinks