diff --git a/appveyor-release.yml b/appveyor-release.yml
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+++ b/appveyor-release.yml
@@ -0,0 +1,61 @@
+## NOTE: this is a temporary copy of the release script, which works around the versioning issue
+## TODO(oleg-nenashev): A real fix / release flow rework for https://github.com/kohsuke/winsw/issues/378 is needed
+
+# Do not build tags and feature branches
+skip_tags: true
+skip_branch_with_pr: true
+
+# Project configuration
+image: Visual Studio 2019
+# platform: Any CPU
+configuration: Release
+
+# Automatically register private account and/or project AppVeyor NuGet feeds.
+nuget:
+  disable_publish_on_pr: true     # disable publishing of .nupkg artifacts 
+
+before_build:
+  # Check SDKs
+  - ECHO "Installed SDKs:"
+  - ps: 'ls "C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft SDKs\Windows\"'
+  # Generates a temporary SNK. Not for real signing
+  - cmd: '"C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft SDKs\Windows\v10.0A\bin\NETFX 4.8 Tools\sn.exe" -k winsw_key.snk'
+
+dotnet_csproj:
+  patch: true
+  file: '**\*.csproj'
+  version: $(appveyor_build_version)
+
+build_script:
+  - dotnet.exe build src\winsw.sln
+  - dotnet.exe publish -f netcoreapp3.1 src\Core\ServiceWrapper\winsw.csproj
+  - dotnet.exe publish -f netcoreapp3.1 -r win-x64 src\Core\ServiceWrapper\winsw.csproj /p:PublishSingleFile=true /p:PublishTrimmed=true
+  - dotnet.exe publish -f netcoreapp3.1 -r win-x86 src\Core\ServiceWrapper\winsw.csproj /p:PublishSingleFile=true /p:PublishTrimmed=true
+
+after_build:
+  - ps: nuget pack WinSW.nuspec -Version $env:APPVEYOR_BUILD_VERSION
+
+test_script:
+  - dotnet.exe test -f net40 --no-build src\Test\winswTests\winswTests.csproj
+  - dotnet.exe test -f net461 --no-build src\Test\winswTests\winswTests.csproj
+  - dotnet.exe test -f netcoreapp3.1 --no-build src\Test\winswTests\winswTests.csproj
+
+artifacts:
+  - path: 'src\Core\ServiceWrapper\bin\Release\net20\WinSW.exe'
+    name: WinSW.NET2.exe
+  - path: 'src\Core\ServiceWrapper\bin\Release\net40\WinSW.exe'
+    name: WinSW.NET4.exe
+  - path: 'src\Core\ServiceWrapper\bin\Release\net461\WinSW.exe'
+    name: WinSW.NET461.exe
+  - path: 'src\Core\ServiceWrapper\bin\Release\netcoreapp3.1\publish\'
+    name: WinSW.NETCore31
+  - path: 'src\Core\ServiceWrapper\bin\Release\netcoreapp3.1\win-x64\publish\WindowsService.exe'
+    name: WinSW.NETCore31.x64
+  - path: 'src\Core\ServiceWrapper\bin\Release\netcoreapp3.1\win-x86\publish\WindowsService.exe'
+    name: WinSW.NETCore31.x86
+  - path: 'WinSW.$(appveyor_build_version).nupkg'
+    name: WinSW.nupkg
+  - path: 'examples\sample-allOptions.xml'
+    name: 'sample-allOptions.xml'
+  - path: 'examples\sample-minimal.xml'
+    name: 'sample-minimal.xml'