Publishing & distribution

# Part 8 — Publishing & distribution

When the project enters the **Delivery** phase, you can start packaging deliverables for shipping.

## 8.1 The Publishing panel

Under the collaboration section, the **Publishing & Distribution** card appears once you reach Delivery. It has two columns — one per language — each showing:

- **Status** badge — *Ready / Partial / Incomplete*
- **Buttons:**
  - **📦 Build publishing bundle** — produces `publishing.en.zip` or `publishing.fr.zip`
  - **🗄 Build archive bundle** — produces `archive.en.zip` or `archive.fr.zip`
  - **📄 View metadata** — opens the **Metadata modal**
  - **🔍 View missing items** — opens the **Missing items modal** which lists every deliverable per language and whether it's present

A **status indicator** at the top of the card uses three colors:

| Color | Meaning |
|---|---|
| 🟢 **Green** | All required deliverables are present — ready to ship |
| 🟡 **Yellow** | Optional pieces missing (b‑roll, portraits) — bundle still builds |
| 🔴 **Red** | Required pieces missing — fix before shipping |

## 8.2 What's in a publishing bundle

The publishing bundle is a single ZIP for one language. It contains:

```
deliverables/
  book.pdf
  book.epub
  audiobook.mp3
  portraits.zip
  broll.zip
  media-bundle.zip
front-matter/
  cover.jpg
  title-page.pdf
  copyright.pdf
metadata.<lang>.json
manifest.<lang>.json
README.txt
```

## 8.3 The archive bundle

The archive bundle is a heavier ZIP for **long‑term preservation**. It contains everything in the publishing bundle *plus*:

- Raw AI outputs
- Intermediate files
- Edited content
- Revision history
- Collaboration data (comments, suggestions, approvals)

Use it for cold storage; use the publishing bundle for distribution.

## 8.4 Distribution & channels

Below the Publishing panel is a **Distribution & Channels** panel. It lets you push the bundle to one of five channels:

| Channel | What it does |
|---|---|
| **⬇ Local download** | Streams the bundle straight to your browser as a ZIP. |
| **✉ Email delivery** | Sends signed download links to a comma‑separated list of recipients with an optional note. |
| **🛰 External publishing endpoint** | POSTs the manifest to a configured webhook (e.g. your distributor's intake). |
| **☁ Cloud export** | Sync to Google Drive, S3, or Azure Blob (configure provider + bucket + region). |
| **🗄 Archive export** | Mirrors the archive ZIP to a long‑term destination with a retention setting. |

Click a channel tile, fill in its configuration modal, click **Continue**, review the manifest in the confirmation modal, and click **Dispatch**. The dispatch result modal shows the outcome (including the actual download buttons for local downloads).

Every dispatch is logged in the **Distribution log** at the bottom of the panel with timestamp, language, channel, status, and full detail JSON you can expand.

---