System Design
Mid-Level
system_design
Design a Highly Available and Scalable URL Shortener like bit.ly.
You are required to create a URL shortener service that takes a long URL and converts it into a shortened version. The shortened URL should redirect users to the original URL when clicked. Consider aspects such as database design, API endpoints, data storage, scalability, and performance issues. How would you ensure the service remains reliable and can handle millions of requests?
To design a URL shortener, we begin with identifying the major components: a database to store the original and shortened URLs, an API service to handle requests, and a mechanism for generating unique keys for the shortened URLs. A relational database or NoSQL can be used depending on the scale requirements. Load balancers can ensure availability, while caching solutions minimize database hits.
Reliability can be ensured using redundancy and failover strategies, while horizontal scaling allows handling of increased load. Monitoring tools can alert in case of issues.
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