SVN checkout ignore folder

Question

Can I ignore a folder on svn checkout? I need to ignore DOCs folder on checkout at my build server.

edit: Ignore externals isn\'t an option. I have

Answer 1

No, ignore is only for adding files.
You can use sparse checkouts (if you use svn 1.5)

Answer 2

You could put the docs folder in an external repository and then use svn checkout --ignore-externals.

Answer 3

This is in TortoiseSVN client 1.7.1 (might be available in some older versions as well):

• SVN checkout --> Select URL of repository

• Click on "Checkout Items" (under Checkout Depth) and select only the folders required!

Answer 4

Yes you can using SVN 1.6. You will need to do a checkout first then mark the folder for exclusion then delete the unwanted folder.

svn checkout http://www.example.com/project
cd project
svn update --set-depth=exclude docs
rm -fr docs

From now on any updates to the working copy won't repopulate the docs folder.

See http://blogs.collab.net/subversion/2009/03/sparse-directories-now-with-exclusion/ and http://subversion.apache.org/docs/release-notes/1.6.html#sparse-directory-exclusion for more details.

Tom

Answer 5

With versions prior to 1.5 I have found that if you checkout only the top most folder and then selectively update, from then on updates only effect what you have checked out. Ie.

svn co -N foo
cd foo
svn up -N bar
svn up

The -N flag makes the operation non-recursive. The above will not check out anything else at the foo level, eg. say there is a folder lala, the final svn up will not check out that folder, but it will update bar.

But at a later time you can svn up lala and thus, add it to the checkout.

Presumably this also works with 1.5.

Answer 6

As a few others have mentioned, you can just use svn:externals properties and then the --ignore-externals option when you checkout. One thing to note, however, is that svn:externals does not necessarily need to refer to another repository. It can be a reference to some other folder in the same repo.