
Show HN: Goat – private URL shortener for teams (ga.tc) - tpwong
https://goatcodes.com
======
tpwong
Hi HN!

Inspired by the internal URL shorteners that many large tech companies seem to
have (commonly known as go links), I wanted to try my hand at building a
hosted version of the same so the rest of us can have this organizational
superpower too.

goatcodes.com is a private URL shortener for teams. Links you shorten will
only work for others on your team. The short domain is
[https://ga.tc](https://ga.tc). It's a pretty basic service right now, I'd
love feedback on what features you would find useful.

Thanks for looking!

~~~
KajMagnus
I like the logo :- ) & the website seems easy to understand. The unique
selling point, is that the links will only work for one's team, right?

I'm thinking someone can use Googles URL shortener instead, and share the
resulting links within the team only — that'd give the same effect?

If the destination page is truly secret, then the company ought to have other
access control features anyway I think.

I'd be worried that you go out of business soon and all links will break.

You can get more feedback here:
[https://usability.testing.exchange](https://usability.testing.exchange) (it's
a free & open source side project I'm doing). You can edit the question text
and ask for feedback about the overall idea, and what other features people
might want.

Book tips:
[http://www.startupwerkboek.nl/startupcenter/Momtest.pdf](http://www.startupwerkboek.nl/startupcenter/Momtest.pdf)
(the first parts are free & the most important ones). This book helps you find
out, before you start writing code, if the underlying idea is something people
want / need. (People, including I, sometimes do the mistake to start writing
code, too early, before they know if the underlying idea is a good idea.)

Anyway I wish you good luck with this, and sometimes in the end everyting
turns out to have been a good idea (even if the project didn't take off), just
because of everything one learned, whilst doing it :- )

~~~
tpwong
Thanks for the links! I'll check out your side project :)

Using Google's URL shortener, or any other public one, generally means you
don't get to choose the link keyword because they share a global namespace.

You wouldn't be able to get goo.gl/team, for instance, but you can with Goat -
the namespace is private. This means you can easily create memorable short
links like ga.tc/team instead of goo.gl/ql1k23.

------
bradknowles
So, I presume from the naming of your project, you are not afraid of being
confused with “goatse”?

For me, once that concept is seared into your brain, that would prevent me
from ever creating anything ever again that begins with those four letters, or
anything that might even remind me of those four letters.

