Рекурсивно копировать папку, исключая некоторые папки

Используйте tar вместе с трубой.

cd /source_directory
tar cf - --exclude=dir_to_exclude . | (cd /destination && tar xvf - )

Вы даже можете использовать эту технику через ssh.

Вы можете использовать find с опцией -prune.

Пример из man find:

       cd /source-dir
       find . -name .snapshot -prune -o \( \! -name *~ -print0 \)|
       cpio -pmd0 /dest-dir

       This command copies the contents of /source-dir to /dest-dir, but omits
       files  and directories named .snapshot (and anything in them).  It also
       omits files or directories whose name ends in ~,  but  not  their  con‐
       tents.  The construct -prune -o \( ... -print0 \) is quite common.  The
       idea here is that the expression before -prune matches things which are
       to  be  pruned.  However, the -prune action itself returns true, so the
       following -o ensures that the right hand side  is  evaluated  only  for
       those  directories  which didn't get pruned (the contents of the pruned
       directories are not even visited, so their  contents  are  irrelevant).
       The  expression on the right hand side of the -o is in parentheses only
       for clarity.  It emphasises that the -print0 action  takes  place  only
       for  things  that  didn't  have  -prune  applied  to them.  Because the
       default `and' condition between tests binds more tightly than -o,  this
       is  the  default anyway, but the parentheses help to show what is going
       on.

Подобно идее Джеффа (непроверенный):

find . -name * -print0 | grep -v "exclude" | xargs -0 -I {} cp -a {} destination/

вы можете использовать tar, с параметром --exclude, а затем развернуть его в пункте назначения. например,

cd /source_directory
tar cvf test.tar --exclude=dir_to_exclude *
mv test.tar /destination 
cd /destination  
tar xvf test.tar

см. справочную страницу tar для дополнительной информации

вызванный ответом @SteveLazaridis, который потерпит неудачу, вот функция оболочки POSIX - просто скопируйте и вставьте в файл с именем cpx в yout $PATH и сделайте его исполняемым (chmod a+x cpr). [Источник теперь поддерживается в GitLab.

#!/bin/sh

# usage: cpx [-n|--dry-run] "from_path" "to_path" "newline_separated_exclude_list"
# limitations: only excludes from "from_path", not it subdirectories

cpx() {
# run in subshell to avoid collisions
(_CopyWithExclude "$@")
}

_CopyWithExclude() {
case "$1" in
-n|--dry-run) { DryRun='echo'; shift; } ;;
esac

from="$1"
to="$2"
exclude="$3"

$DryRun mkdir -p "$to"

if [ -z "$exclude" ]; then
    cp "$from" "$to"
    return
fi

ls -A1 "$from" \
    | while IFS= read -r f; do
    unset excluded
    if [ -n "$exclude" ]; then
    for x in $(printf "$exclude"); do
        if [ "$f" = "$x" ]; then
        excluded=1
        break
        fi
    done
    fi
    f="${f#$from/}"
    if [ -z "$excluded" ]; then
    $DryRun cp -R "$f" "$to"
    else
    [ -n "$DryRun" ] && echo "skip '$f'"
    fi
done
}

# Do not execute if being sourced
[ "${0#*cpx}" != "$0" ] && cpx "$@"

Пример использования

EXCLUDE="
.git
my_secret_stuff
"
cpr "$HOME/my_stuff" "/media/usb" "$EXCLUDE"

EXCLUDE="foo bar blah jah"                                                                             
DEST=$1

for i in *
do
    for x in $EXCLUDE
    do  
        if [ $x != $i ]; then
            cp -a $i $DEST
        fi  
    done
done

Непроверено...