diff --git a/performrelease.sh b/performrelease.sh
new file mode 100755
index 0000000..ddc16d0
--- /dev/null
+++ b/performrelease.sh
@@ -0,0 +1,149 @@
+#!/bin/sh
+# Licensed to the Apache Software Foundation (ASF) under one
+# or more contributor license agreements.  See the NOTICE file
+# distributed with this work for additional information
+# regarding copyright ownership.  The ASF licenses this file
+# to you under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the
+# "License"); you may not use this file except in compliance
+# with the License.  You may obtain a copy of the License at
+# 
+#   http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
+# 
+# Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing,
+# software distributed under the License is distributed on an
+# "AS IS" BASIS, WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY
+# KIND, either express or implied.  See the License for the
+# specific language governing permissions and limitations
+# under the License.
+
+version='TESTBUILD'
+sourcedir=~/cloudstack-cloudmonkey
+outputdir=/tmp/cloudstack-cloudmonkey-build/
+branch='master'
+tag='no'
+certid='X'
+committosvn='X'
+
+usage(){
+    echo "usage: $0 -v version [-b branch] [-s source dir] [-o output dir] [-t] [-u] [-c] [-h]"
+    echo "  -v sets the version"
+    echo "  -b sets the branch (defaults to 'master')"
+    echo "  -s sets the source directory (defaults to $sourcedir)"
+    echo "  -o sets the output directory (defaults to $outputdir)"
+    echo "  -t tags the git repo with the version"
+    echo "  -u sets the certificate ID to sign with (if not provided, the default key is attempted)"
+    echo "  -c commits build artifacts to cloudstack dev dist dir in svn"
+    echo "  -h"
+}
+
+while getopts v:s:o:b:u:tch opt
+do
+    case "$opt" in
+      v)  version="$OPTARG";;
+      s)  sourcedir="$OPTARG";;
+      o)  outputdir="$OPTARG";;
+      b)  branch="$OPTARG";;
+      t)  tag="yes";;
+      u)  certid="$OPTARG";;
+      c)  committosvn="yes";;
+      h)  usage
+          exit 0;;
+      /?)       # unknown flag
+          usage
+          exit 1;;
+    esac
+done
+shift `expr $OPTIND - 1`
+
+if [ $version == "TESTBUILD" ]; then
+    echo >&2 "A version must be specified with the -v option: build_asf.sh -v 4.0.0.RC1"
+    exit 1
+fi
+
+echo "Using version: $version"
+echo "Using source directory: $sourcedir"
+echo "Using output directory: $outputdir"
+echo "Using branch: $branch"
+if [ "$tag" == "yes" ]; then
+    if [ "$certid" == "X" ]; then
+        echo "Tagging the branch with the version number, and signing the branch with your default certificate."
+    else
+        echo "Tagging the branch with the version number, and signing the branch with certificate ID $certid."
+    fi
+else
+    echo "The branch will not be tagged.  You should consider doing this."
+fi
+
+if [ -d "$outputdir" ]; then
+    rm -r $outputdir/*
+else
+    mkdir $outputdir
+fi
+
+cd $sourcedir
+
+echo 'checking out correct branch'
+git checkout $branch
+
+git clean -f
+
+export commitsh=`git show HEAD | head -n 1 | cut -d ' ' -f 2`
+echo "releasing as $commitsh"
+
+echo 'archiving'
+git archive --format=tar --prefix=apache-cloudstack-cloudmonkey-$version-src/ $branch > $outputdir/apache-cloudstack-cloudmonkey-$version-src.tar
+bzip2 $outputdir/apache-cloudstack-cloudmonkey-$version-src.tar
+
+cd $outputdir
+echo 'armor'
+if [ "$certid" == "X" ]; then
+  gpg -v --armor --output apache-cloudstack-cloudmonkey-$version-src.tar.bz2.asc --detach-sig apache-cloudstack-cloudmonkey-$version-src.tar.bz2
+else
+  gpg -v --default-key $certid --armor --output apache-cloudstack-cloudmonkey-$version-src.tar.bz2.asc --detach-sig apache-cloudstack-cloudmonkey-$version-src.tar.bz2
+fi
+
+echo 'md5'
+gpg -v --print-md MD5 apache-cloudstack-cloudmonkey-$version-src.tar.bz2 > apache-cloudstack-cloudmonkey-$version-src.tar.bz2.md5
+
+echo 'sha'
+gpg -v --print-md SHA512 apache-cloudstack-cloudmonkey-$version-src.tar.bz2 > apache-cloudstack-cloudmonkey-$version-src.tar.bz2.sha
+
+echo 'verify'
+gpg -v --verify apache-cloudstack-cloudmonkey-$version-src.tar.bz2.asc apache-cloudstack-cloudmonkey-$version-src.tar.bz2
+
+if [ "$tag" == "yes" ]; then
+  echo 'tag'
+  cd $sourcedir
+  if [ "$certid" == "X" ]; then
+      git tag -s $version -m "Tagging release $version on branch $branch."
+  else
+      git tag -u $certid -s $version -m "Tagging release $version on branch $branch."
+  fi
+fi
+
+if [ "$committosvn" == "yes" ]; then
+  echo 'committing artifacts to svn'
+  rm -Rf /tmp/cloudstack-dev-dist
+  cd /tmp
+  svn co https://dist.apache.org/repos/dist/dev/cloudstack/ cloudstack-dev-dist
+  cd cloudstack-dev-dist
+  if [ -d "cloudmonkey-$version" ]; then
+    cd cloudmonkey-$version
+    svn rm *
+  else
+    mkdir cloudmonkey-$version
+    svn add cloudmonkey-$version
+    cd cloudmonkey-$version
+  fi
+  cp $outputdir/apache-cloudstack-cloudmonkey-$version-src.tar.bz2 .
+  cp $outputdir/apache-cloudstack-cloudmonkey-$version-src.tar.bz2.asc .
+  cp $outputdir/apache-cloudstack-cloudmonkey-$version-src.tar.bz2.md5 .
+  cp $outputdir/apache-cloudstack-cloudmonkey-$version-src.tar.bz2.sha .
+  svn add apache-cloudstack-cloudmonkey-$version-src.tar.bz2
+  svn add apache-cloudstack-cloudmonkey-$version-src.tar.bz2.asc
+  svn add apache-cloudstack-cloudmonkey-$version-src.tar.bz2.md5
+  svn add apache-cloudstack-cloudmonkey-$version-src.tar.bz2.sha
+  svn commit -m "Committing release candidate artifacts for $version to dist/dev/cloudstack in preparation for release vote"
+fi
+
+echo "completed.  use commit-sh of $commitsh when starting the VOTE thread"