Exclude a file from SVN version control

svn exclude file from version control
subversion
subversion remove from repository
leave out of source code management
do not use in checkout of revision controlled repository

An actually useful bit of information:

Excluding/ignoring files

You can exclude files (e.g. *.o) from a directory by typing (in this directory):

svn propset svn:ignore *.o

To show the ignored files, type:

svn status --no-ignore

From: http://www5.epfl.ch/swis/page18243-en.html

However, I think you have to delete that file from your repository, or it'll still be checked out? Better safe than sorry, if you're trying to avoid overwriting a local settings file, for instance.

Based on the advice below, I would create templates with the suffix .copyme

That should be obvious enough!

Background from the Subversion FAQ:

http://subversion.tigris.org/faq.html#ignore-commit

I have a file in my project that every developer must change, but I don't want those local mods to ever be committed. How can I make 'svn commit' ignore the file?

The answer is: don't put that file under version control. Instead, put a template of the file under version control, something like "file.tmpl".

Then, after the initial 'svn checkout', have your users (or your build system) do a normal OS copy of the template to the proper filename, and have users customize the copy. The file is unversioned, so it will never be committed. And if you wish, you can add the file to its parent directory's svn:ignore property, so it doesn't show up as '?' in the 'svn status' command.