Below is a bug report from a Debian user.  The associated Debian BTS
ticket is http://bugs.debian.org/440345.  Please ensure that
440345@bugs.debian.org remains in the nosy list for this roundup
ticket.

On Fri, Aug 31, 2007 at 09:33:27PM +0300, Antti-Juhani Kaijanaho wrote:
> It would be nice if it were possible to generate a ChangeLog for
> tarball distribution by including "darcs changes > ChangeLog" in the
> predist pref.  This is not currently possible:
>
> $ darcs setpref predist "darcs changes > ChangeLog"
> Changing value of predist from '' to 'darcs changes > ChangeLog'
> $ darcs dist
> darcs failed:  Not a repository
> Created dist as /home/ajk/src/darcs-monitor/darcs-monitor.tar.gz
> $
>
> There is a related upstream bug report asking for the ability to
> have darcs dist generate a manifest; I cannot currently look it up
> as bugs.darcs.net is not responding for me.  However, the upstream
> report suggests a workaround which does not appeal to me, as it
> requires the tarball generating human to do something more than just
> "darcs dist".
>
> The upstream report logs include the suggestion of having darcs dist
> export the repository path in the predist command's environment.  I
> find that a good idea.

I think there may be a more general issue here with wanting to include stuff in
darcs dist that isn't strictly speaking in the darcs repository.

Seems like such a feature would be a useful (the more general one), but we would
have to work out a reasonable user interface to it.  The reason we would want to
push for more general ideas is to avoid an explosion of switches and options.

On Thu, Jul 24, 2008 at 10:21:02AM -0000, Eric Kow wrote:
> 
> Eric Kow <eric.kow@gmail.com> added the comment:
> 
> I think there may be a more general issue here with wanting to include stuff in
> darcs dist that isn't strictly speaking in the darcs repository.
> 
> Seems like such a feature would be a useful (the more general one), but we would
> have to work out a reasonable user interface to it.  The reason we would want to
> push for more general ideas is to avoid an explosion of switches and options.

Doesn't seem to me like any new switches or options are required for
this feature.

Antti-Juhani is right, no new switches or fanciness needed.
Marking this as a duplicate of issue1555 which suggests an environment variable
that will make this possible.