dist: document our release procedure

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+Here are most of the steps we (maintainers) follow when making a release.
+
+* start from a clean, up-to-date git directory.
+
+    git checkout master; git pull
+
+* Run ./configure && make maintainerclean
+
+* Ensure that the desired versions of autoconf, automake, bison, etc.
+  are in your PATH.
+
+* Ensure that you're on "master" with no uncommitted diffs.
+  This should produce no output: git checkout master; git diff
+
+* Make sure your local gnulib directory is up to date.
+
+* Run bootstrap, (assuming your local copy of gnulib is in /gnulib):
+  ./bootstrap --gnulib-srcdir=/gnulib
+
+FIXME: enable excluded programs like arch? to get their manual pages?
+
+* Pre-release testing:
+  On at least one SELinux-enabled (enforcing) and one non-SELinux system,
+    run all tests, both root-only and regular.
+  Run *all* non-root tests, including expensive and very expensive ones i.e.,
+    run this: make check RUN_VERY_EXPENSIVE_TESTS=yes RUN_EXPENSIVE_TESTS=yes
+
+  Run the root-only tests:
+  sudo env PATH="$PATH" NON_ROOT_USERNAME=$USER make -k check-root
+
+* Run "make distcheck"
+
+* Manually set the date, version number, and [stable/alpha/beta] on
+  line 3 of NEWS, then do this:
+
+    v=7.1
+    git commit -F <(printf 'version '$v'\n\n* NEWS: Record release date.\n') -a
+    git tag -s -m "coreutils $v" v$v HEAD
+
+* Run the following to create release tarballs.  Your choice selects the
+  corresponding upload-to destination in the emitted gnupload command.
+
+    # "TYPE" must be major, beta or alpha
+    XZ_OPT=-9e make TYPE
+
+* Test the tarball.  copy it to a few odd-ball systems and ensure that
+  it builds and passes all tests.
+
+* While that's happening, write the release announcement that you will
+  soon post.
+
+Once all the builds and tests have passed,
+
+* Run the gnupload command suggested by your "XZ_OPT=-9e make major" run above.
+
+* Wait a few minutes (maybe up to 30?) and then use the release URLs to
+  download all tarball/signature pairs and use gpg --verify to ensure
+  that they're all valid.
+
+* Push the new tag:
+  git push origin tag v<JUST_RELEASED_VERSION_NUMBER>
+
+* Send the gpg-signed announcement mail, e.g.,
+    To: info-gnu@gnu.org, coreutils-announce@gnu.org
+    Cc: coordinator@translationproject.org, bug-coreutils@gnu.org
+    Subject: coreutils-7.1 released [stable]
+
+* Approve the announcement here:
+  http://lists.gnu.org/mailman/admindb/coreutils-announce
+
+* Announce it on Savannah, too:
+  From here:
+    https://savannah.gnu.org/projects/coreutils/
+  click on the "submit news", then write something like the following:
+
+    The announcement is here:
+      http://article.gmane.org/gmane.comp.gnu.core-utils.announce/48
+
+  Then go here to approve it:
+    https://savannah.gnu.org/news/approve.php?group=coreutils
+
+* For non-alpha releases, update the on-line manual at
+
+    http://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/
+
+  Run `make web-manual', then copy the contents of doc/manual
+  into a CVS checkout of the coreutils manual repository.
+  Also edit coreutils.html (FIXME? why?) before doing a CVS commit.
+
+    CVS_RSH=ssh \
+    cvs -d:ext:$USER@cvs.savannah.gnu.org:/web/coreutils co coreutils
+
+  Be sure to "cvs add" any files that "cvs status" marks with "?".
+  That is necessary whenever a new texinfo node is added.  Each becomes
+  a new file in html_node that must then be "cvs add"ed.