Generate TinyURLs With 1 Line Of PHP

Posted February 10, 2009 by Brian Cray

Reading time: About 0 minutes

All you need is allow_url_fopen enabled in your php.ini and PHP version 4.3.0 or higher. If you don’t know if you have allow_url_fopen enabled, just run the function phpinfo(), which displays all of your PHP settings.

Here’s the 1 line you’ve been waiting for…

$shortenedurl = file_get_contents('http://tinyurl.com/api-create.php?url=' . urlencode('http://' . $_SERVER['HTTP_HOST']  . '/' . $_SERVER['REQUEST_URI']));

What you end up with is a tinyurl.com url of the current page. Sweet, huh? This can be especially important if you have a “Tweet this” link!

About the author

Brian Cray is a Columbus, Ohio-based web entrepreneur & consultant. View some of Brian’s work in his portfolio and learn how to make kick ass websites by reading his blog.