[](https://crates.io/crates/pastebin)
[](https://docs.rs/pastebin)
[](https://travis-ci.org/mexus/pastebin)
# Simple pastebin server
## About
A simple multipurpose RESTful storage server written in
[Rust](https://www.rust-lang.org/). It uses [MongoDB](https://www.mongodb.com/)
as a storage backend, [Iron](https://github.com/iron/iron) web framework to do
the web stuff and [highlight.js](https://highlightjs.org/) to do synax
highlighting.
## Running the service
Build (`cargo build` or `cargo build --release`) or install the library (`cargo
install pastebin`). Then simply launch the executable (there's just one
executable generated) with `--help` flag to see the options. Basically you have
to specify mongodb connection options, path to the `html` (ans `sh`) templates
(`templates` folder in the repo) and server external address.
Currently a clean exit is not supported, so just kill the process when you want
to stop it.
## User experience
There are two ways how the service could be used: via the REST api (and command
line tools that implement it) or via your browser.
The only diffence comes when you download a paste. If you download it using some
command line tools, the data (the paste) will be passed as it is. But for
browsers the situation is different: if the paste is considered to be a textual
one (plain text, bash script, c++ code, …) a fancy HTML5 page with a [syntax
hightlighter](https://highlightjs.org/) will be presented to you.
**NOTICE** Please note that browser is detected by its
[user-agent](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_agent#Use_in_HTTP), so if for
some reason you have disabled reporting of the user agent in your browser the
service will consider you as the REST api user and won't provide a fancy output
for your GET requests (related to the pastes only, the submission form will work
as expected anyhow).
### REST api
To upload data (be it text or a file) simply send it using either a `POST` or a
`PUT` request to `/`. You can additinally specify a file name as a URI segment,
like `/file.txt`. The service will reply with a link that contains ID of the
paste. That address should be used later to manipulate the paste.
To specify an expiry date add a query parameter `expires` to your `POST` request
with value of a desired expiration date (UTC) in the form of a unix timestamp,
like the following: `?expires=1546300800` for the 1st of January, 2019 (UTC). If
you don't specify the date it will be set to the server's defaults (default
expiration time is passed as a command line argument to the service
application). In order to make a paste to be stored without a time limit you
have to pass a special value `never`, like the following: `?expires=never`.
To download data send a `GET` request to `/id`, where `id` is a paste ID
obtained on the previous step. Actually you don't have to specifically obtain an
ID, just use the returned link as it is. If the paste has information about its
file name the service will redirect the request to `/id/file-name` so you'll be
able to save the file under the correct name.
You can optionally provide a desired file name like `/id/file-name`.
To delete a paste send a `DELETE` request to `/id`, and the paste will be
deleted (if it exists obviously).
### Command line interface
One can utilize the REST api of the service by using some simple command-line
tools like `curl` or `wget`. A convenience script is provided by the service,
to download it send a `PUT` or a `POST` request on the `/paste.sh` URL. Or you
can grab it from the git repo: [paste.sh](templates/paste.sh.tera), but don't
forget to replace a `{{prefix}}` placeholder with the website http address
(like `https://example.com`).
### Via browser
The main page — `/` — represents a text upload form. To upload a whole file,
especially a binary one, I would advise to use a CLI file uploader.
A *readme* page is available at `/readme` (there's also a link on the `/` page).
## Performance
I've run a simple performance test on my maching and the service is able to
accept about 6500 post requests per second for 10 KB samples and about 3000
posts requests per seconds for 100 KB samples.
## Limitations
As for now, there is a hard limit of **15 megabytes** on any incoming data. This
limitations comes from a [BSON document
size](https://docs.mongodb.com/manual/reference/limits/) with some reserve for
extra data.
While it is technically possible to store larger data chunks in a MongoDB using
a [GridFS](https://docs.mongodb.com/manual/core/gridfs/) it has not been
implemented in this project yet. But it is on the plan :)