diff --git a/.gitignore b/.gitignore
index ea34033..6d9d2bf 100644
--- a/.gitignore
+++ b/.gitignore
@@ -1,3 +1,4 @@
 .DS_Store
 .sass-cache/
 CoffeeScript.wdgt/
+pkg/
diff --git a/Rakefile b/Rakefile
index 50f12f7..3d18afc 100644
--- a/Rakefile
+++ b/Rakefile
@@ -11,3 +11,9 @@ task :build do
   cp CoffeeScript::Source.bundled_path, 'CoffeeScript.wdgt'
 end
 
+desc 'build a release widget'
+task :release => :build do
+  mkdir_p 'pkg'
+  system %{tar jcvf pkg/CoffeeScript-#{File.read('VERSION').strip}.tar.bz2 CoffeeScript.wdgt}
+end
+
diff --git a/VERSION b/VERSION
index e69de29..8acdd82 100644
--- a/VERSION
+++ b/VERSION
@@ -0,0 +1 @@
+0.0.1