Index: deps/rabbit/scripts/rabbitmq-defaults
--- deps/rabbit/scripts/rabbitmq-defaults.orig
+++ deps/rabbit/scripts/rabbitmq-defaults
@@ -9,6 +9,11 @@
 ### next line potentially updated in package install steps
 SYS_PREFIX=
 
+export RABBITMQ_MNESIA_BASE=/var/rabbitmq/mnesia
+export RABBITMQ_CONF_ENV_FILE=/etc/rabbitmq/rabbitmq-env.conf
+# ensure VM and Elixir scripts are running under the same locale
+export LANG=en_US.UTF-8
+
 CLEAN_BOOT_FILE=start_clean
 SASL_BOOT_FILE=start_sasl
 BOOT_MODULE="rabbit"