add a /release directory with a skeleton settings.xml for releases and instructions/scripts to release/deploy and any mixture therof

add a /release directory with settings.xml and all necessary variable changes to make a release candidate and to deploy. 

change-scalaversion.sh 2.11
mvn release:prepare -Papache-release
mvn release:perform -Papache-release
change-scala-version 2.12
mvn release:prepare -Papache-release
mvn release:perform -Papache-release

It may be as simple as adding your personal GPG information to the `~/.m2/settings.xml` file. and running a script like above.  Spark and Flink have  examples which could be overkill:

Spark:

https://github.com/apache/spark/blob/master/dev/make-distribution.sh

https://github.com/apache/spark/tree/master/dev/create-release

Flink:

https://github.com/apache/flink/tree/master/tools/releasing

I would also propose that we consider a  Makefile for our builds or cmake, as we are moving closer to python and .cpp modules. Could be useful, we should at least consider it.