# Go (URL Shortener) A project of [GMU SRCT](http://srct.gmu.edu). Go is a drop-in URL shortening service. It aims to provide an easily branded service for institutions that wish to widely disseminate information without unnecessarily outsourcing branding. ## Package Installation ### Prerequisities & Required Packages First, install python, pip, and git on your system. * Python is the programming language used for Django, the web framework used by Go. * Git is the version control system used for SRCT projects. Open a terminal and run the following command: `$ sudo apt-get update` This retrieves links to the most up-to-date and secure versions of your packages. Next, with: `$ sudo apt-get install python git` you install python and git. Now, we're going to clone down a copy of the Go codebase from git.gmu.edu, the SRCT code respository. Configure your ssh keys by following the directions at git.gmu.edu/help/ssh/README. Now, on your computer, navigate to the directory in which you want to download the project (perhaps one called development/ or something similar), and run `$ git clone git@git.gmu.edu:srct/go.git` Finally, install these packages from the standard repositories: - VirtualBox - Vagrant - Ansible - ## On Deployemnt ### Cron In order to expire links, you need to set up a cron job to run the manage.py expirelinks command regularly. A sample cron script is available in the repository and is named go-cleanlinks.cron. Drop this in cron.hourly and change the paths so that they point to the virtualenv activate script and manage.py.