Home > Article > Backend Development > Use Python Flask to build an efficient and concise URL shortening service
First, create a new directory for your project and open a terminal in that directory. Then, run the following command to create a new virtual environment for your project:
# For windows:
virtualenv venv
# For linux:
python3 -m venv venv
Activate the virtual environment by running the following command:
# For windows
venv/Scripts/activate
# For linux
source venv/bin/ activate
Next, install Flask by running the following command:
pip install Flask
Create a file named Create a new file for app.py
and add the following code to set up a basic Flask application:
from flask import Flask, request, redirect app = Flask(__name__) @app.route('/') def index(): return 'Welcome to the URL Shortener' if __name__ == '__main__': app.run(debug=True)
Run the following command to start the Flask development server:
python app.py
In your Visit http://localhost:5000
in your web browser to view the "Welcome to URL Shortener" message.
Next, we will store the original URL and its corresponding shortened URL in a Python dictionary. Add the following code to your app.py
file:
url_map = {} @app.route('/shorten', methods=['POST']) def shorten_url(): original_url = request.form['url'] short_url = generate_short_url(original_url) url_map[short_url] = original_url return short_url def generate_short_url(original_url): # Generate a unique short URL for the original URL # (We'll implement this in the next step) pass
To generate unique short URLs, we will use ha Greek function. A hash function takes an input (in this case, a raw URL) and returns a fixed-length output (a short URL). We will use the SHA-1 hash function, which is part of the Pythonhashlib library. Add the following code to your app.py file: The user is redirected to the original URL. Add the following code to your
app.pyimport hashlib def generate_short_url(original_url): hash = hashlib.sha1(original_url.encode()) short_url = hash.hexdigest()[:8] return short_url
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