How to Improve this Visual Studio Post-Build Event

Question

I am currently using Visual Studio 2010 post-build event to minify my JavaScript files. The problem is every time I add a new JavaScript file I have to update the post build event. What I want to do is make the script a bit more flexible.

Directory structure:

\Scripts\

• Script1.debug.js
• Script2.debug.js
• Script3.debug.js

Here is my script's current state:

ajaxmin.exe "$(ProjectDir)Scripts\Script1.debug.js" -out "$(ProjectDir)Scripts\Script1.js" -clobber
ajaxmin.exe "$(ProjectDir)Scripts\Script2.debug.js" -out "$(ProjectDir)Scripts\Script2.js" -clobber
ajaxmin.exe "$(ProjectDir)Scripts\Script3.debug.js" -out "$(ProjectDir)Scripts\Script3.js" -clobber

I want this script to find every *.debug.js file minify it and output it to *.js. How do I achieve this?

Script1.debug.js --> Script1.js
Script2.debug.js --> Script2.js
Script3.debug.js --> Script3.js

Answer 1

Create a batch script file to do the task and call the batch file from your PostBuild event.

Answer 2

Don't use a post build event. After installing the tool, an MSBuild task was added that runs the minifier automatically for a .js file in your project. You need a bit of minor surgery to the project file. The details are explained in this blog post.