moving all references to `release` branch

was previously `master`
diff --git a/CONTRIBUTING.md b/CONTRIBUTING.md
index bb85d58..44f2393 100644
--- a/CONTRIBUTING.md
+++ b/CONTRIBUTING.md
@@ -5,7 +5,7 @@
 ## Our Development Process
 New versions are being developed in the "dev" branch,
 or in their own feature branch.
-When they are deemed ready for a release, they are merged into "master".
+When they are deemed ready for a release, they are merged into "release".
 
 As a consequences, all contributions must stage first through "dev"
 or their own feature branch.
@@ -383,7 +383,7 @@
 that get run will depend on the destination branch you specify. Some tests take
 longer to run than others. Currently, our CI is set up to run a short
 series of tests when creating a PR to the dev branch and a longer series of tests
-when creating a PR to the master branch. You can look in the configuration files
+when creating a PR to the release branch. You can look in the configuration files
 of the respective CI platform for more information on what gets run when.
 
 Most people will just want to create a PR with the destination set to their local dev
diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
index 0f36a5f..dcca766 100644
--- a/README.md
+++ b/README.md
@@ -193,7 +193,7 @@
 
 ## Contributing
 
-The "dev" branch is the one where all contributions are merged before reaching "master".
-If you plan to propose a patch, please commit into the "dev" branch, or its own feature branch.
-Direct commit to "master" are not permitted.
+The `dev` branch is the one where all contributions are merged before reaching `release`.
+If you plan to propose a patch, please commit into the `dev` branch, or its own feature branch.
+Direct commit to `release` are not permitted.
 For more information, please read [CONTRIBUTING](CONTRIBUTING.md).
diff --git a/TESTING.md b/TESTING.md
index 7e53051..b851d1c 100644
--- a/TESTING.md
+++ b/TESTING.md
@@ -27,7 +27,7 @@
 
 Long Tests
 ----------
-Long tests run on all commits to `master` branch,
+Long tests run on all commits to `release` branch,
 and once a day on the current version of `dev` branch,
 on TravisCI.
 They consist of the following tests:
diff --git a/appveyor.yml b/appveyor.yml
index 169c66b..d608f1a 100644
--- a/appveyor.yml
+++ b/appveyor.yml
@@ -1,13 +1,13 @@
-# Following tests are run _only_ on master branch
-# To reproduce these tests, it's possible to push into a branch `appveyorTest`
-# or a branch `visual*`, they will intentionnally trigger `master` tests
+# Following tests are run _only_ on `release` branch
+# and on selected feature branch named `appveyorTest` or `visual*`
 
 -
   version: 1.0.{build}
   branches:
     only:
+    - release
     - master
-    - appveyorTest
+    - /appveyor*/
     - /visual*/
   environment:
     matrix:
@@ -92,9 +92,9 @@
           cd programs\ && 7z a -tzip -mx9 zstd-win-binary-%PLATFORM%.zip zstd.exe &&
           appveyor PushArtifact zstd-win-binary-%PLATFORM%.zip &&
           cp zstd.exe ..\bin\zstd.exe &&
-          git clone --depth 1 --branch master https://github.com/facebook/zstd &&
+          git clone --depth 1 --branch release https://github.com/facebook/zstd &&
           cd zstd &&
-          git archive --format=tar master -o zstd-src.tar &&
+          git archive --format=tar release -o zstd-src.tar &&
           ..\zstd -19 zstd-src.tar &&
           appveyor PushArtifact zstd-src.tar.zst &&
           certUtil -hashfile zstd-src.tar.zst SHA256 > zstd-src.tar.zst.sha256.sig &&
diff --git a/contrib/seekable_format/zstd_seekable_compression_format.md b/contrib/seekable_format/zstd_seekable_compression_format.md
index bf3080f..55aebfd 100644
--- a/contrib/seekable_format/zstd_seekable_compression_format.md
+++ b/contrib/seekable_format/zstd_seekable_compression_format.md
@@ -53,7 +53,7 @@
 The total size of the skippable frame, not including the `Skippable_Magic_Number` or `Frame_Size`.
 This is for compatibility with [Zstandard skippable frames].
 
-[Zstandard skippable frames]: https://github.com/facebook/zstd/blob/master/doc/zstd_compression_format.md#skippable-frames
+[Zstandard skippable frames]: https://github.com/facebook/zstd/blob/release/doc/zstd_compression_format.md#skippable-frames
 
 #### `Seek_Table_Footer`
 The seek table footer format is as follows:
diff --git a/lib/compress/zstd_compress.c b/lib/compress/zstd_compress.c
index eb7780c..386b051 100644
--- a/lib/compress/zstd_compress.c
+++ b/lib/compress/zstd_compress.c
@@ -3258,7 +3258,7 @@
 
 /* Dictionary format :
  * See :
- * https://github.com/facebook/zstd/blob/master/doc/zstd_compression_format.md#dictionary-format
+ * https://github.com/facebook/zstd/blob/release/doc/zstd_compression_format.md#dictionary-format
  */
 /*! ZSTD_loadZstdDictionary() :
  * @return : dictID, or an error code
diff --git a/lib/decompress/zstd_decompress_block.c b/lib/decompress/zstd_decompress_block.c
index bec82e8..19cbdc5 100644
--- a/lib/decompress/zstd_decompress_block.c
+++ b/lib/decompress/zstd_decompress_block.c
@@ -236,7 +236,7 @@
 
 /* Default FSE distribution tables.
  * These are pre-calculated FSE decoding tables using default distributions as defined in specification :
- * https://github.com/facebook/zstd/blob/master/doc/zstd_compression_format.md#default-distributions
+ * https://github.com/facebook/zstd/blob/release/doc/zstd_compression_format.md#default-distributions
  * They were generated programmatically with following method :
  * - start from default distributions, present in /lib/common/zstd_internal.h
  * - generate tables normally, using ZSTD_buildFSETable()
diff --git a/tests/README.md b/tests/README.md
index 23e0076..1e40c46 100644
--- a/tests/README.md
+++ b/tests/README.md
@@ -28,7 +28,7 @@
 be run on any machine via the command line interface.
 
 There are three modes of usage for this script: fastmode will just run a minimal single
-build comparison (between facebook:dev and facebook:master), onetime will pull all the current
+build comparison (between facebook:dev and facebook:release), onetime will pull all the current
 pull requests from the zstd repo and compare facebook:dev to all of them once, continuous
 will continuously get pull requests from the zstd repo and run benchmarks against facebook:dev.
 
diff --git a/tests/automated_benchmarking.py b/tests/automated_benchmarking.py
index d0cfb1f..77eea29 100644
--- a/tests/automated_benchmarking.py
+++ b/tests/automated_benchmarking.py
@@ -20,7 +20,7 @@
 
 GITHUB_API_PR_URL = "https://api.github.com/repos/facebook/zstd/pulls?state=open"
 GITHUB_URL_TEMPLATE = "https://github.com/{}/zstd"
-MASTER_BUILD = {"user": "facebook", "branch": "dev", "hash": None}
+RELEASE_BUILD = {"user": "facebook", "branch": "dev", "hash": None}
 
 # check to see if there are any new PRs every minute
 DEFAULT_MAX_API_CALL_FREQUENCY_SEC = 60
@@ -264,11 +264,11 @@
         for test_build in builds:
             if dictionary_filename == None:
                 regressions = get_regressions(
-                    MASTER_BUILD, test_build, iterations, filenames, levels
+                    RELEASE_BUILD, test_build, iterations, filenames, levels
                 )
             else:
                 regressions = get_regressions_dictionary(
-                    MASTER_BUILD, test_build, filenames, dictionary_filename, levels, iterations
+                    RELEASE_BUILD, test_build, filenames, dictionary_filename, levels, iterations
                 )
             body = "\n".join(regressions)
             if len(regressions) > 0:
@@ -320,7 +320,7 @@
         builds = [{"user": None, "branch": "None", "hash": None}]
         main(filenames, levels, iterations, builds, frequency=frequency, dictionary_filename=dictionary_filename)
     elif mode == "fastmode":
-        builds = [{"user": "facebook", "branch": "master", "hash": None}]
+        builds = [{"user": "facebook", "branch": "release", "hash": None}]
         main(filenames, levels, iterations, builds, frequency=frequency, dictionary_filename=dictionary_filename)
     else:
         main(filenames, levels, iterations, None, emails, True, frequency=frequency, dictionary_filename=dictionary_filename)