Ant for EPUB

Inasmuch as I like to automate processes as much as possible, here’s two Ant targets/macros for automating zipping an EPUB file and checking it with epubcheck:

• Zipping an EPUB file so that it retains an uncompressed mimetypefile

  <target name="epub.zip"
          description="Package up an EPUB" >
    <delete file="${build.dir}/${epub}.epub" />
    <!-- The 'mimetype' file is supposed to be uncompressed and the
         first thing in the .epub file so the file conforms to the
         (rather long) signature for EPUB files. -->
    <zip destfile="${build.dir}/${epub}.mimetype"
         compress="false"
         encoding="UTF-8">
      <fileset dir="${build.dir}/${epub}" includes="mimetype" />
    </zip>
    <!-- We'd really rather have the rest compressed, thank you. -->
    <zip destfile="${build.dir}/${epub}.zip"
         compress="true"
         encoding="UTF-8"
         level="9">
      <zipfileset dir="${build.dir}/${epub}/META-INF" prefix="META-INF"/>
      <zipfileset dir="${build.dir}/${epub}/OPS" prefix="OPS"/>
    </zip>
    <!-- Putting them together this way is the best way so far found
         for getting only 'mimetype' uncompressed in the .epub. -->
    <zip destfile="${build.dir}/${epub}.epub"
         update="true"
         keepcompression="true"
         encoding="UTF-8">
      <zipfileset src="${build.dir}/${epub}.mimetype" />
      <zipfileset src="${build.dir}/${epub}.zip" />
    </zip>
    <!-- Delete the temporary Zip files. -->
    <delete file="${build.dir}/${epub}.mimetype" />
    <delete file="${build.dir}/${epub}.zip" />
  </target>

• Checking an EPUB with epubcheck

  <macrodef name="epub.check"
            description="Check an epub">
    <attribute name="epub" description="Name of the EPUB" />
    <sequential>
      <java jar="${epubcheck.jar}"
            fork="true">
        <arg value="${build.dir}/@{epub}.epub" />
      </java>
    </sequential>
  </macrodef>
  
  <target name="epub.check.YourEPUB"
          description="Check YourEPUB EPUB">
    <epub.check epub="YourEPUB"/>
  </target>

  (In practice, the epub.check.YourEPUB target is generated by XSLT, but that’s another story.)