How to make Metro (React Native packager) ignore certain directories

Question

Problem:

My project has a @providesModule naming collision when trying to run react-native run-ios from the command line. It is conflicting with autogenerated dir dist/ which is created by another npm package, esdoc. I would like to be able to keep this autogenerated dir and just make the react native packager ignore the dist/ dir.

Error Message:

[01/23/2017, 13:17:07] <START> Building Haste Map
    Failed to build DependencyGraph: @providesModule naming collision:
      Duplicate module name: ann
      Paths: /Users/thurt/projects/example/package.json collides with /Users/thurt/projects/example/dist/esdoc/package.json

This error is caused by a @providesModule declaration with the same name across two different files.
Error: @providesModule naming collision:
  Duplicate module name: ann
  Paths: /Users/thurt/projects/example/package.json collides with /Users/thurt/projects/example/dist/esdoc/package.json

This error is caused by a @providesModule declaration with the same name across two different files.
    at HasteMap._updateHasteMap (/Users/thurt/projects/example/node_modules/react-native/packager/react-packager/src/node-haste/DependencyGraph/HasteMap.js:158:13)
    at p.getName.then.name (/Users/thurt/projects/example/node_modules/react-native/packager/react-packager/src/node-haste/DependencyGraph/HasteMap.js:133:31)