diff --git a/tools/make_tarball.py b/tools/make_tarball.py
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..93e39b1
--- /dev/null
+++ b/tools/make_tarball.py
@@ -0,0 +1,21 @@
+import os
+
+repo = "http://ipython.scipy.org/svn/ipython/trunk"
+basename = 'ipython'
+workdir = './mkdist'
+
+workdir = os.path.abspath(workdir)
+def oscmd(c):
+    print ">",c
+    os.system(c)
+
+
+assert not os.path.isdir(workdir)
+os.mkdir(workdir)
+os.chdir(workdir)
+
+oscmd('svn co %s %s' % (repo,basename))
+ver = os.popen('svnversion %s' % basename)
+tarname = '%s.r%s.tgz' % (basename, ver)
+oscmd('tar czvf %s %s' % (tarname, basename))
+shutil.rmtree(workdir)