How to compress URL parameters

Question

Say I have a single-page application that uses a third party API for content. The app’s logic is in-browser only, and there is no backend I can write to.

To allow de

Answer 1

Why not use a third party link shortener?

(I am assuming you don't have a problem with URI length limits since you mentioned this is an existing application.)

It looks like you're writing a Greasemonkey script or thereabouts, so perhaps you have access to GM_xmlhttpRequest(), which would allow use of a third party link shortener.

Otherwise, you'd need to use XMLHttpRequest() and host your own link shortening service on the same server to avoid crossing the same-origin policy boundary. A quick online search for hosting your own shorteners supplied me with a list of 7 free/open source PHP link shortener scripts and one more on GitHub, though the question likely excludes this kind of approach since "The app’s logic is in-browser only, and there is no backend I can write to."

You can see example code implementing this kind of thing in the URL Shortener UserScript (for Greasemonkey), which pops up a shortened version of the current page's URL when you press SHIFT+T.

Of course, shorteners will redirect users to the long form URL, but this would be a problem in any non-server-side solution. At least a shortener can theoretically proxy (like Apache's RewriteRule with [P]) or use a tag.