diff --git a/config.vars.in b/config.vars.in
index 00f6d7341..42cdabbac 100644
--- a/config.vars.in
+++ b/config.vars.in
@@ -37,7 +37,7 @@
 
 %% Platform-specific installation paths
 {release, true}.
-{release_dir, "@RELEASE_DIR@"}.
+{release_dir, "${SCRIPT_DIR%/*}"}.
 {sysconfdir, "{{release_dir}}/etc"}.
 {installuser, "@INSTALLUSER@"}.
 {erl, "{{release_dir}}/{{erts_vsn}}/bin/erl"}.
diff --git a/ejabberdctl.template b/ejabberdctl.template
index bb707b2ae..387eaab7b 100755
--- a/ejabberdctl.template
+++ b/ejabberdctl.template
@@ -7,6 +7,8 @@ ERL_MAX_PORTS=32000
 ERL_PROCESSES=250000
 ERL_MAX_ETS_TABLES=1400
 
+SCRIPT_DIR=$(cd ${0%/*} && pwd)
+
 # define default environment variables
 NODE=ejabberd
 HOST=localhost
diff --git a/rel/files/erl b/rel/files/erl
index 34c158340..6f65e3fc9 100755
--- a/rel/files/erl
+++ b/rel/files/erl
@@ -9,10 +9,13 @@
 ## Note that this script makes the assumption that there is a start_clean.boot
 ## file available in $ROOTDIR/release/VSN.
 
+# Determine the abspath of where this script is executing from.
+ERTS_BIN_DIR=$(cd ${0%/*} && pwd)
+
 # Now determine the root directory -- this script runs from erts-VSN/bin,
 # so we simply need to strip off two dirs from the end of the ERTS_BIN_DIR
 # path.
-ROOTDIR={{release_dir}}
+ROOTDIR=${ERTS_BIN_DIR%/*/*}
 
 # Parse out release and erts info
 START_ERL=`cat $ROOTDIR/releases/start_erl.data`