Can I exclude specific file types from my repository?

You can exclude specific file types from your repository
with the svn propset command, for example :

cd /path/to/your/project
svn propset svn:ignore "*.class" .

Some common file types you should normally exclude :

svn propset svn:ignore "*.avi" .
svn propset svn:ignore "*.class" .
svn propset svn:ignore "*.jar" .
svn propset svn:ignore "*.mov" .
svn propset svn:ignore "*.pdf" .
svn propset svn:ignore "*.pyc" .
svn propset svn:ignore "*.war" .