How to build a low-code, self-hosted URL shortener in 3 steps

The author emphasizes the importance of privacy in software selection, leading them to create a personal URL shortener using n8n, a tool that enables rapid web application development without extensive coding. Inspired by a community presentation, they crafted a self-hosted solution that creates short URLs, redirects to long URLs, and generates usage statistics on a dashboard. The project employs n8n and nginx Docker images, with Airtable as the database, and requires basic n8n experience. The implementation involved configuring Docker, setting up a proxy via nginx, and structuring workflows for URL creation, redirection, and data visualization. The author details the process of generating unique URL IDs, updating databases, and constructing a dashboard to display statistics, encouraging others to customize the workflow for varied applications while sharing insights on a community platform.