Techwhizz|Your Daily Technology Update

URL shortening services was introduced to use in emails when there was only 80 columns allowed. In recent days internet users are dealing with the twitter phenomena, the 140 character micro blogging platform.

Micro bloggers are using many URL shortening services. TinyUrl , bit.ly and tr.im are among the most famous one. Recently tr.im users heard a bad news of service shut down and its entire links could be dead by January 1st, 2010.

The major reason for shutting down the tr.im is that they are not following any business model to keep this service alive. Same is the case with other URL shortening services.

To keep yourself safe from loosing shorten URLs why not run your own URL shortening for you website and blog.

Here is a list of opensource URL shortening scripts you can use with your website.

Phurl
This script runs on PHP and MySQL. PHP gd module is required for CAPTCHA support. Apache rewrite module is optional.
You have a better idea now, that it supports CAPTCHA and reCAPTCHA. It has basic administration panel for deleting the URL deletion.

TightURL
This script is written in PHP and uses the MySQL database. The main feature of this script is that it give protection against spam, before shortening the URL it checks it from the spam database.

BrokenScript
It is just a simple script. It requires easy reference to shorten the URL.

YOURLS
Quite nice script also written using PHP & MySQL. With this service public and private shorts links can be generated. Random custom keywords can also be used for short links. Admin panel is dressed up with AJAX and comes up with useful features like click count and edit/delete. Developers API is also available.

SHORTY
This URL shortening script comes up with nice Administration panel. Admin interface gives the liberty to edit/delete the links and also click counts can be viewed.

Wordpress URL shortening plugins.

Short URL Plug-in
Shorten the links of your posts and pages and also keep track of all the clicks.

YOURLS WordPress plug-in
This plugin has an extra functionality of tweets. It lets you tweet your shorten URL automatically. Easy to install and configure.

WP-Chunk
if you are tired of long URLs in your post comments this plugin is definitely for you. It will help you shorten the tidy URLs in your post comments.

Pretty Link
Shorten your post URLs with your own domain name it also keep track of all clicks on your shorten URLs.

Shorter Links
Automatically shorten the URL of post when you saved it. Short link can be easily edited into related keywords.

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