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- A git client installed and on your path
- Apache Ant installed and on your path (see BUILDING.txt in the root of the code repository for version requirements)
- The latest release of the minimum Java version that the Tomcat version runs on installed and on your path
- Windows OS (you can do it on Linux but it involves a lot more hassle)
- GnuPG installed
- A public key that is part of the Apache web of trust
- A reasonable internet connection (you will need to upload ~100MB)
The above can be accomplished on a Windows 10 Virtual Machine from Microsoft's Edge Development resources. Download + unpack the archive for your VM software and launch the VM. Login, open a PowerShell.exe window as Administrator, and installed Chocolatey:
PS C:\Users\IEUser> Set-ExecutionPolicy Bypass -Scope Process -Force; [System.Net.ServicePointManager]::SecurityProtocol = [System.Net.ServicePointManager]::SecurityProtocol -bor 3072; iex ((New-Object System.Net.WebClient).DownloadString('https://chocolatey.org/install.ps1'))
Once Chocolatey is installed, you can install all the above prerequisites at once:
PS C:\Users\ISUser> choco install git svn adoptopenjdk8 ant gnupg
This command will run for a while, and ask you repeatedly if it's okay to run "chocolateyInstall.ps1", which you will have to do to proceed. Once the above command has completed, you have all the software prerequisites installed and on your PATH. Well, once you quick PowerShell and launch a new CMD.EXE or PowerShell window, of course 
Preliminary checks
- Check that the version numbers have been incremented after the previous release, as expected. (e.g. https://github.com/apache/tomcat/commit/9f1c4aae1ea29624aa70c10ca188083253f6f2d0#diff-d05193a10baf9408128c699650245e52)
- Check that the changelog file mentions your login name as release manager for this release (e.g. "Tomcat 7.0.94 (markt)").
- Check whether the
KEYSfile differs fromhttps://dist.apache.org/repos/dist/release/tomcat/tomcat-7/KEYSone. The latter one will be replaced after you do a release. Check that theKEYSfile contains your public key.
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